Using proxies with cURL and the command line

cURL is the quickest way to confirm a proxy is alive before wiring it into a script. It's also useful for debugging when something further up the stack isn't working.

Basic request through a proxy

curl -x http://user-CC-us-s10:[email protected]:7001 https://example.com

Confirming the exit IP

Point cURL at any "what's my IP" endpoint to confirm you're actually routing through the proxy and not your own connection:

curl -x http://user-CC-us-s10:[email protected]:7001 https://api.ipify.org

If the returned IP matches your own connection, double-check the -x flag and that your credentials don't have a typo — a silently ignored malformed proxy flag is the most common cause of this.

Useful flags

• -v — verbose output, shows the full request/response including proxy CONNECT handshake
• --max-time 15 — fail fast instead of hanging on a dead route
• -o /dev/null -s -w "%{http_code}\n" — print just the status code, handy for quick health checks in a loop