Free Download Manager is a download accelerator first and a torrent client second, and its documentation reflects that. FDM's own tutorial gives the path: open Settings from the main menu (the icon with three lines), go to the Network panel and select Configure manually. After that, the record runs out. Which proxy types are supported, whether a username and password can be entered, and whether the setting reaches the torrent engine for peers, DHT and UDP are all unconfirmed. We did not run FDM in our lab, so we do not guess. Below is what is known, and a test that replaces the guess with a count.
The known parts
- Engine: libtorrent, updated to version 2.0.11 in the FDM 6.29 release notes. libtorrent can proxy peer connections, and over SOCKS5 it tries to relay DHT and uTP with UDP ASSOCIATE. Whether FDM switches any of that on is the open question.
- Current version: 6.34, dated May 19, 2026, for Windows, macOS, Linux and Android.
- SOCKS5 history: contradictory. A 2016 reply on FDM's blog said SOCKS5 was not supported; a 2013 forum answer described a per-download Proxy tab in FDM 3 and 5. Neither describes version 6.
- Licence: the site calls FDM open source, but we found no source repository for version 6, so we do not repeat the claim.
The limits that hold whatever FDM does
On residential, and on a shared IP past its included gigabyte, traffic is billed per GB, and a torrent you seed sends its payload through the proxy a second time; our terms describe what counts. Treat our SOCKS5 as TCP only: we do not advertise UDP relay, so even if FDM hands the proxy to libtorrent, DHT, UDP trackers and uTP will not run through it. An HTTP proxy carries no UDP. A proxy does not encrypt. Whatever FDM sends outside the proxy leaves from your own IP, and for a copyright-enforcement worry, the advice in the qBittorrent project's wiki applies to every libtorrent client: consider a VPN. Using our proxies for unauthorised sharing is not allowed under the allowed-use policy.
A ten-minute test
You need the proxy's IP (resolve the host on your order), its exit address (the curl line from our proxy checker prints it), and a lawful torrent such as a current Linux image.
- Enter the proxy under Configure manually, using whichever type FDM offers that matches a port on your order. Restart FDM.
- Start the torrent and let it run for two minutes.
- List FDM's connections.
Windows (PowerShell, with the process ID from Task Manager's Details tab):
$p = 1234
Get-NetTCPConnection -OwningProcess $p -State Established | Group-Object RemoteAddress | Sort-Object Count -Descending | Select-Object Count, Name
Get-NetUDPEndpoint -OwningProcess $p | Select-Object LocalAddress, LocalPort
Linux (find the process name first with ps -e | grep -i -e fdm -e download):
ss -Htnp state established | grep -i PROCESS_NAME
ss -Huanp | grep -i PROCESS_NAME
- Capture the UDP port the second command printed, in Wireshark (
udp.port == PORT) or withsudo tcpdump -ni any udp port PORT, for one minute.
Read it like this:
| What you see | What it means |
|---|---|
| Every TCP connection goes to the proxy's address, no UDP to public addresses | Peers proxied, UDP dropped. The good case on a TCP-only proxy |
| Every TCP connection goes to the proxy, UDP leaves to many addresses | Peers proxied, DHT and uTP direct. Turn them off in FDM if it offers the switch |
| TCP connections to many addresses | The proxy does not reach the torrent engine, and peers see your own IP |
Run the same check on an ordinary HTTP download in FDM as a control. It should show connections to the proxy's address and nowhere else; if it does not, the problem is the proxy entry, not the torrent engine.
If peers go direct
Two options keep the job on a proxy. A system-level tool such as Proxifier can force an application's TCP connections through a proxy; what it does with FDM's UDP we have not tested, so measure again afterwards. Or move the torrent to a client that documents peer proxying, such as qBittorrent, and keep FDM for HTTP.
Use the HTTP download when the file is the goal
This is where FDM earns its place. Most Linux distributions and many open-source projects publish the same image on HTTP mirrors. Downloaded through the proxy over HTTP, a 4 GB image crosses the meter once: $20.80 on residential at checkout. As a torrent seeded to a ratio of 1.0 it crosses twice, $36.80, before overhead. On a datacenter IP, at $1.90/IP (dedicated) a month with no bandwidth cap, the difference disappears from the bill but not from the port, and unmetered is not unlimited. Peer-to-peer traffic for lawful content is fine on residential and on dedicated ISP and datacenter IPs, which carry no traffic meter. The cost calculator runs the comparison at your own volumes, and the torrent client comparison shows FDM's unknowns next to the clients that publish theirs.