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Overview

Browserbase offers flexible proxy configuration options, allowing you to use our built-in proxies, bring your own, or combine both. Proxies are configured when creating a session through the API.

Proxy usage measures the total data transferred when routing internet traffic through an intermediary server. It includes all incoming and outgoing data - from webpage content and downloads to the technical overhead of headers, encryption, and authentication.

When you load a website through a proxy, the data must flow to the proxy server first before reaching its final destination, with every request and response being counted towards your total bandwidth usage.

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Proxy Configuration Options

Enable Browserbase proxies easily with the default configuration:

curl -X POST 'https://api.browserbase.com/v1/sessions' \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-H "x-bb-api-key: $BROWSERBASE_API_KEY" \
-d '{
  "projectId": "'$BROWSERBASE_PROJECT_ID'",
  "proxies": true
}'

Alternatively you can list it as the only rule in the proxies array:

curl -X POST 'https://api.browserbase.com/v1/sessions' \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-H "x-bb-api-key: $BROWSERBASE_API_KEY" \
-d '{
  "projectId": "'$BROWSERBASE_PROJECT_ID'",
  "proxies": [
    { "type": "browserbase" }
  ]
}'

To use these proxy configurations, you need to create a session with the desired proxy settings through the Sessions API, and then connect to that session. Here some examples:

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Best Practices

When working with proxies, it’s important to account for potential latency introduced by proxy connections. To ensure your automations don’t fail due to premature timeouts, we recommend increasing default page navigation timeouts.

A good starting point is 60 seconds or more, depending on your specific use case. Here’s an example of how to set an extended timeout:

Playwright
// Increase timeout to 60 seconds (60000 milliseconds)
await page.goto("https://example.com", { timeout: 60000 });

This extended timeout gives the proxy sufficient time to establish a connection with the target server and complete the page load, reducing the likelihood of timeout errors in your automation scripts.

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Limitations

Some high-risk categories are restricted by our proxy vendors and cannot be proxied which includes:

  • All Apple domains, including iTunes and App stores

  • Entertainment (e.g., Netflix, Playstation)

  • Banking and other financial institutions

  • Some Google domains

  • Streaming

  • Ticketing

  • Mailing

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