Going live: the checklist before you trade with real money
- You go live when your method is tested and documented, not when you're bored of demo.
- Start with money you can afford to lose entirely and very low risk per trade.
- Your first months live are for checking your discipline under pressure, not for making a lot.
Moving from a demo account to a live account is a step many traders underestimate. The charts are the same, so is the platform. Yet as soon as real money is on the line, your behaviour changes: you hesitate, you cut too early, you move your stop. This lesson helps you prepare for that moment so it happens under the right conditions.
A key reminder before you start: leveraged trading loses money for most retail traders. Going live isn't a reward, it's taking on risk that needs to be kept in check.
The checklist before going live
Only go live if you can answer yes to every one of these questions. If even one answer is no, stay on demo until you've fixed it.
- I have a written trading plan: markets, hours, setups, entries, exits, risk, routine and review.
- I've tested my method with a backtest on a big enough sample, then a forward test on demo for several weeks.
- My demo results are consistent with my backtest, and I followed my plan on the vast majority of my trades.
- I keep a journal for every trade and do a review every week.
- I know my expected worst losing streak and the drawdown I need to be able to sit through.
- I've chosen a regulated broker (FCA, ASIC or CFTC/NFA, for example), with negative balance protection where it applies, and I understand its costs: spread, commission, swap.
- The money I deposit is money I can lose without it affecting my life: no emergency savings, no borrowed money.
- I've set my limits: risk per trade, maximum loss per day and per week.
Start with a small account
Your first live account is a learning account. Its job isn't to make money, but to check that you follow your plan when your emotions are genuinely involved. A small account limits the cost of your beginner mistakes, which will definitely happen.
Expect a difference between demo and live, even with a good broker. Execution can be slightly less favourable, with a little slippage on market orders, and spreads can widen around news releases. These gaps are small on one trade, but they add up over a hundred trades: build them into your expectations.
Make sure that small account still works with your method. With micro lots (0.01 lot) you can risk small amounts in forex, but a very wide stop can make the minimum size too big for your risk. Do the maths before you deposit.
- Capital (USD account)
- $1,000
- Risk per trade
- 0.5%, i.e. $5
- Stop loss on EUR/USD
- 50 pips
- Pip value for 0.01 lot
- $0.10
- Risk with 0.01 lot
- 50 × $0.10 = $5
- Position size
- 0.01 lot, the minimum size
Here the minimum size matches the planned risk exactly. With a 100-pip stop, 0.01 lot would mean $10, or 1%: beyond that, the account would be too small for this method.
Position size calculator
Raise your risk step by step
Even if your plan eventually calls for 1% risk per trade, start lower. Stepping up in stages, only when your discipline holds, saves you from paying a high price for the psychological shock of trading live.
| Stage | Risk per trade | Condition to move up |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 0.25% | 20 trades with the plan followed on every one |
| 2 | 0.5% | 20 more trades, plan followed, drawdown within limits |
| 3 | 0.75% | Results consistent with the backtest |
| 4 | 1% | The plan's target risk, never to be exceeded |
These thresholds are an example, to adapt to your own plan. The important rule is the direction: you only move up when the discipline is there, and you drop back a stage after a spell of not following the plan or a deeper drawdown than expected.
Realistic goals
For the first few months, set process goals rather than profit goals. Follow your plan on every trade, keep your journal, do your weekly review, never break your daily limit. These are goals you fully control.
A goal like "double my account in three months" pushes you to increase size and pile on trades. A fixed monthly return target makes no more sense: the market doesn't pay a salary, and some months will be negative even with a good method.
Plan what you'll do if things go wrong, too. Write your stop rule now: for example, if your account loses a share of capital set in advance, you go back to demo, reread your journal and only return to live once you've found the cause. Deciding that rule with a cool head stops you negotiating with yourself at the worst possible moment.
Track your first steps with reliable numbers
Going live is the right time to set up automatic tracking. Connecting your account to Analyse-Trading builds your history from your broker's data: every trade, your equity curve and your drawdown are recorded with no manual entry, which makes it easy to compare with your demo results.
Check your understanding
0 / 3Educational content, not investment advice. Leveraged trading carries a high risk of losing money rapidly: most retail investor accounts lose money on these products.