How to set up cTrader correctly for a prop firm account

Setting up cTrader correctly means getting five settings ready before your first order: volume units, Quick Trade mode, default protection (stop loss and take profit) for each order type, your time zone and a workspace saved to your cTrader ID. This guide follows the menus in the official cTrader help (November 2026) and finishes with a concrete setup for an EmergeFX account based on its actual daily loss limit.

Before you set up cTrader: cTrader ID and account type

You always log in to cTrader with a cTrader ID (cTID), a single user that brings together accounts from different brokers or firms; linked accounts appear automatically when you sign in. If you’re just starting out, read what cTrader is and how it works first.

1. Select the right account in the account bar and confirm the number before every session, especially if you also have a demo.
2. Check Settings > Account > Properties: account type (Hedging or Netting), leverage and stop-out type.

On a Hedging account, opposite positions can coexist on the same symbol; on Netting, an opposite order reduces, closes or reverses the position. If your prop firm prohibits hedging, always close from the position itself (the Close button), never with an opposite order.

cTrader settings: trading options step by step

Units and default quantity

In Settings > Application > Assets choose lots or units; with Set unit price per asset class you can set the unit by asset class. Use lots: that’s how sizes are expressed on prop firm accounts.

The Quick Trade quantity is set in the volume box next to the chart’s Buy/Sell buttons (arrows, typed value or a preset list) and is saved with the workspace’s Quick Trade parameters.

Quick Trade: single-click, double-click or disabled

Quick Trade creates orders, adds volume or reverses positions in a single step with no confirmation. It’s configured in Settings > Application > Quick Trade; before first use you have to accept its terms, and changes are saved with Apply.

Mode	What it does	When to use it
Single-click (default)	One click on Buy or Sell sends a market order	Experienced scalping with default protection turned on
Double-click	Requires a double click	The sensible choice on a prop firm account
Disabled	You trade from the new order window (F9)	If you trade symbols with very different stops

Leave Close all positions without warning and Cancel all orders without warning unchecked: with them on, a mass close runs with no confirmation window. cTrader doesn’t ask you to confirm each individual order, so double-click mode is your only barrier against an accidental click.

cTrader default protection: stop loss and take profit

What many traders call “Default Protection” now lives inside Quick Trade, under Order type settings: one tab for market orders, another for stop orders and another for limit orders. That’s also where you set the market range (maximum accepted deviation), the stop order trigger and the trailing stop.

1. Open Settings > Application > Quick Trade.
2. On the market tab of Order type settings, turn on Stop loss and Take profit and enter the distance in pips.
3. Repeat on the stop and limit tabs: if you leave one empty, pending orders you drag onto the chart will go out unprotected.
4. Click Apply and test an order on the demo to see the SL and TP lines.

The detail that costs the most accounts: this protection is the same for every symbol (the official forum has requests from 2022 to 2025 to set it per instrument). A 15-pip stop is reasonable on EURUSD, but on gold or an index it can end up right next to the price, because the pip size changes. If you trade both groups, use default protection for the pairs and the new order window for everything else, or a separate workspace for each group. Each symbol’s pip size is shown in Symbol info, in the Active Symbol Panel.

The new order window (F9) gives you more control: stops in pips, price, percentage of balance or amount; up to five take profits; trailing stop; break-even with a trigger and offset; and four stop trigger methods (Trade side by default, Opposite side and their double versions). Protections stay on the server even if you close the platform. The step-by-step is in how to trade on cTrader step by step.

Chart time zone

Click the current time in the bottom right and choose the offset. It affects the dates and times on your charts and trades, but not Market Watch’s daily change, which uses server time. A good default is UTC-5 (New York in winter): US news comes out at 8:30 and the Wall Street open is at 9:30. During US daylight saving time, from March, switch to UTC-4.

cTrader templates and workspaces

A chart template saves chart type, scale, indicators and colors. A workspace saves everything else: open charts, Quick Trade, theme, layout, language, sounds, units, symbol lists and notifications.

Action	Chart template	Workspace
Where it is	Chart template icon in the chart toolbar	My Workspace drop-down, top right
Save	Save template > name > Save	Save workspace > name > Save
Apply	Select it: it applies to charts you open afterward	Pick it from the drop-down
Auto-save	No: overwrite it by saving with the same name	Yes, when you switch workspaces or close cTrader

A setup that works: a clean “Execution” template and an “Analysis” template with your indicators, plus one workspace per account. Watch out: trading units reset to the default when you switch workspaces, so check them in each one.

Colors, theme, sounds and chart view

• Theme and sounds: Settings > Application > General (Colour theme dark or light; Sounds, on by default). Keep sounds on: they tell you when a stop or pending order fills.
• Privacy: if you share screenshots, hide your account number, balance and cTID name under Privacy.
• View: right-click the chart > Viewing options. Turn on Bid price line and Ask price line (you buy at the Ask and sell at the Bid), Positions, Orders and Price alerts.

Price alerts in cTrader

You create them with the Price alert icon in the right-hand toolbar, by right-clicking a price or from the Price alerts tab in Market Watch. For each one you choose the symbol, Bid or Ask, the condition (greater than or equal to, less than or equal to), the price and a pop-up with sound. They stay active with cTrader closed, but the pop-up and sound only work while the platform is open; to get them elsewhere, turn on email in your cTID notifications. A practical use: an alert at the price where your position would reach half of your daily stop.

Depth of Market (DoM): which one to choose

You set the default type in Settings > Application > Market Watch > Default DoM type.

Type	What it shows	Can you trade from it?
Standard	Liquidity available at each price	No, view only
Price	Price ladder: sell on the left, buy on the right; the last digit is the fractional pip	Yes: stop and limit orders and position management
VWAP	Expected average price based on volume; hover to see pip value and commission	Yes, designed for large orders

Favorite symbols and market sessions

In Market Watch, click Create new watchlist, name it and add symbols with the + or with each symbol’s star (Ctrl + F opens search). A short list called “Funded,” with only what you trade, cuts down on temptation.

The status bar shows the current session, and Market hours, in the Active Symbol Panel, shows each symbol’s hours with a countdown. Exact hours depend on the broker. Reference for winter time (November to March):

Session	New York (ET)	London (GMT)	India (IST)	Sydney (AEDT)
Sydney	17:00 – 2:00	22:00 – 7:00	3:30 – 12:30	9:00 – 18:00
Tokyo	19:00 – 4:00	0:00 – 9:00	5:30 – 14:30	11:00 – 20:00
London	3:00 – 11:00	8:00 – 16:00	13:30 – 21:30	19:00 – 3:00
New York	8:00 – 17:00	13:00 – 22:00	18:30 – 3:30	0:00 – 9:00

cTrader Web vs Desktop: where your settings are saved

Workspaces are a cloud feature tied to your cTID: you get them back on another computer or with another broker when you log in. But cTrader Web workspaces don’t work on desktop and vice versa: you have to set up each version separately. On Web, hotkeys can’t be customized, and only cTrader Windows offers profiles for running several instances or cTIDs at once.

The classic mistake is setting everything up on Windows and then one day logging in from the browser with no default protection. More differences in cTrader Web vs Desktop and other slip-ups in common cTrader errors.

cTrader on a funded account: recommended setup for EmergeFX

The starting point is your account’s daily loss limit. On EURUSD, one pip is worth $10 per standard lot (100,000 units).

Example: EmergeFX Instant Funding 25K

Limits: $450 daily loss limit and $1,500 static drawdown.

• Risk per trade: $90 (20% of the daily loss limit).
• Default SL: 15 pips on all three Order type settings tabs; 30-pip TP (1:2).
• Default size: $90 ÷ (15 pips × $10) = 0.6 lots.
• Suggested personal daily stop: $270 (three full losses), leaving a $180 buffer for spread, commissions and slippage.
• Quick Trade: double-click, and no mass closes without a warning.

Against the $1,500 drawdown, that daily stop gives you more than five bad days in a row; trading all the way to the daily limit, only three. If you switch to gold, recalculate your stop and size with the pip shown in Symbol info.

EmergeFX 1-Step or 2-Step Evaluation

The limits are percentages: 3% daily and 6% maximum on 1-Step; 5% and 10% on 2-Step. For every $10,000 of account size, 3% is $300 and 5% is $500. Apply the same proportions: about 20% of the daily limit per trade and a stop at 60%.

The personal daily stop is your call, not an Emerge rule. The official cTrader help doesn’t describe an automatic daily-loss lockout, so it comes down to your discipline; if you plan to use a cBot to cut yourself off, check with support first. For trading plans built around these limits, see the best strategies to pass a prop firm challenge and the forex funding challenge explained.

Setting up cTrader with Emerge Profit

EmergeFX accounts are simulated trading accounts on currencies, indices and commodities, traded on cTrader or DXtrade:

• EmergeFX Evaluation (from $68): 1-Step (10% target, 1:30 margin) or 2-Step (8% and 5%, 1:100 margin), a 5-day minimum and no time limit. Static drawdown and weekend holding allowed.
• EmergeFX Instant Funding (from $120): no evaluation, 5K to 250K, static drawdown, 1:100 equivalent margin, swing and news trading allowed.

Three rules affect your setup: hedging is prohibited, each trade must last at least 10 seconds, and the Operational Consistency and Position Sizing Rule penalizes sudden jumps in size, so don’t use the position’s Double button to “win it back.” Copy trading is allowed only between your own accounts.

How to set up cTrader: FAQ

Sources

• cTrader Help Centre – Settings (Windows) and Settings (Web) (accessed November 2026).
• cTrader Help Centre – Protections, Orders and Chart trading.
• cTrader Help Centre – Workspaces, Workspaces (Web) and Chart toolbar.
• cTrader Help Centre – User time offset, Price alerts, Market Watch, Active Symbol Panel, Depth of market and Positions and deals.
• cTrader forum – requests for per-symbol Quick Trade settings (2022 and 2025).
• FOREX.com – Forex market hours (November 2026).

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