FTMO account sizes & per-size rules

The full FTMO size ladder

Prop pricing scales sub-linearly with account size — roughly the square root of the size ratio — so the biggest account is almost never the best value per dollar of usable buffer. Each line below shows the modelled list price, the first-phase profit target and the loss buffer expressed as a percentage of the account.

Read the buffer column first. On a static drawdown, the dollar buffer is the only number that limits your position size; the account label is marketing. A trader risking 1% per trade on the 200k account is taking the same dollar risk as one risking 20× that percentage on the smallest.

• 10k — $345, 10% target = $1k, 10% buffer = $1k of loss room
• 25k — $545, 10% target = $2.5k, 10% buffer = $2.5k of loss room
• 50k — $770, 10% target = $5k, 10% buffer = $5k of loss room
• 100k — $1.1k, 10% target = $10k, 10% buffer = $10k of loss room
• 200k — $1.5k, 10% target = $20k, 10% buffer = $20k of loss room

Which FTMO size is actually the best value

Cost per dollar of loss buffer is the honest comparison. 10k costs 0.345 per dollar of buffer; 25k costs 0.218 per dollar of buffer; 50k costs 0.154 per dollar of buffer; 100k costs 0.109 per dollar of buffer; 200k costs 0.077 per dollar of buffer. The cheapest ratio is where the firm is subsidising you the most, and it is usually a mid tier rather than the flagship.

The second filter is your own stop distance. Work out the worst-case dollar loss of a normal trade at your usual size, multiply by five consecutive losers, and buy the smallest account whose buffer absorbs that without breaching. Buying above that point is paying for headroom you will never trade into; buying below it guarantees a reset fee.

What the 25k and 50k tiers mean in practice

The small tiers are where most traders start and where most resets happen, because the dollar buffer is small enough that a single mis-sized position ends the account. On a forex account, one standard lot on EURUSD moves about $10 per pip — on a 25k account, a 40-pip stop on two lots is already a meaningful share of your buffer.

The larger tiers change the psychology more than the maths. Same rules, same percentage targets, bigger dollar swings — which is why traders who pass consistently on a small account often breach the first week on a large one. Scale the account only after you have taken at least two payouts at the size below.

• Static maximum loss: Your drawdown is measured from the initial balance and does not trail your equity high. Once you are up 8% on a 10% buffer, that entire cushion stays yours — the opposite of the trailing models used across futures.
• 5% daily loss limit: Calculated on the higher of balance or equity at the daily reset, and it includes floating losses on open positions. Most FTMO failures are daily-limit breaches from holding a loser through a news print, not blown maximum drawdown.
• News and weekend rules: The standard FTMO Challenge allows news trading and weekend holding; the Swing account exists specifically to remove restrictions on both. Check which product you bought before an NFP release.

Rules that stay the same at every size

Firms rarely vary the rulebook by account size — they vary the dollar limits. On FTMO the constants are the static drawdown, the 90% profit split, the bi-weekly on demand payout window and the consistency position (none on the evaluation).

• News trading: conditionally allowed — Allowed on the evaluation. On funded accounts the restriction applies to the two minutes either side of high-impact releases for swing-restricted account types.
• EAs: allowed — EAs are permitted, including on funded accounts. Tick-scalping, latency and copy-arbitrage EAs are the ones that get flagged.
• Weekend holding: conditionally allowed — Standard accounts must be flat before the weekend; the Swing add-on removes that and the news restriction together.
• Time limit: none — No calendar deadline on either phase since the 2023 rule overhaul.

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