- Black background or dark theme for the iPad version of the app. All in all, I think this is a great app and would definitely like to use this as my primary trading platform because it is great for trading on the go. I just really hope the bugs and features I listed can be addressed soon so I can give the app a full 5-star review!
- Top 24 Best Technical Analysis Trading Software. Technical Analysis Trading Software are provided by most of the brokerage companies, some of them offer the application for free, while some of them charge money for them.
The StockBrokers.com best online brokers 2020 review (10th annual) took six months to complete and produced over 30,000 words of research. Here's how we tested.
Active Trader Pro provides an in-depth suite of options tools to monitor market trends, fine-tune strategies, and execute simple and complex options trades. Direct single- and multi-leg options trades 2 to the exchange of your choice, or let Fidelity's smart order routing help you find the best prices; Multi-leg trading ticket allows you to build up to four-legged options strategies.
Day Trading, which is buying and selling shares during the same trading session, exploded in popularity back in the booming stock market of the 1990s. Everyone was trying to get in and out of securities and make a profit on an intraday basis. After the dot-com market crash in 2000, the SEC and FINRA established the “Pattern Day Trader” rule in 2001, which increased the requirements to day trade in an effort to better protect consumers.
To day trade today, you have at least $25,000 to comply with the Pattern Day Trader rule. Traders must also meet margin requirements. The government put these laws into place to protect investors. Bottom line: day trading is risky.
To day trade effectively, you need to choose a day trading platform. As a day trader, you need a combination of low-cost trades coupled with a feature-rich trading platform and great trading tools. Price isn't everything; therefore, many day traders are willing to pay more to get the tools they need to trade more efficiently.
Best Trading Platforms
Here's a breakdown of some of the best online brokers for day trading.
- TradeStation - Best platform technology
- TD Ameritrade - Best desktop platform
- Interactive Brokers - Best for professionals
- Fidelity - Best order execution
- E*TRADE - Best web-based platform
Best platform technology - Open Account
Promo Offer: Commission-Free Trades on Stocks, ETFs & Options Trades
As a trading technology leader, TradeStation shines, supporting traders through its web-based platform as well as its desktop platform, which we rated No. 1 for Platform Technology. Both are excellent. Tools in the TradeStation arsenal include Radar Screen (real-time streaming watch lists with 329 customizable columns), Scanner (custom screening), Matrix (ladder trading), and Walk-Forward Optimizer (advanced strategy testing), among others. Using TradeStation's proprietary coding language, EasyLanguage, traders can even code their own apps for the platform and make them available in TradeStation's own TradingApp Store. Read full review
Promo Offer: Commission-Free Trades on Stocks, ETFs & Options Trades
As a trading technology leader, TradeStation shines, supporting traders through its web-based platform as well as its desktop platform, which we rated No. 1 for Platform Technology. Both are excellent. Tools in the TradeStation arsenal include Radar Screen (real-time streaming watch lists with 329 customizable columns), Scanner (custom screening), Matrix (ladder trading), and Walk-Forward Optimizer (advanced strategy testing), among others. Using TradeStation's proprietary coding language, EasyLanguage, traders can even code their own apps for the platform and make them available in TradeStation's own TradingApp Store. Read full review
Best desktop platform
TD Ameritrade thinkorswim is our No. 1 desktop platform for 2020 and is home to an impressive array of tools. Highlights include virtual trading with fake money, performing advanced earnings analysis, plotting economic (FRED) data, charting social sentiment, backtesting, and even replaying historical markets tick-by-tick. TD Ameritrade also enables traders to create and conduct real-time stock scans, share charts and workspace layouts, and perform advanced options analysis. Read full review
TD Ameritrade thinkorswim is our No. 1 desktop platform for 2020 and is home to an impressive array of tools. Highlights include virtual trading with fake money, performing advanced earnings analysis, plotting economic (FRED) data, charting social sentiment, backtesting, and even replaying historical markets tick-by-tick. TD Ameritrade also enables traders to create and conduct real-time stock scans, share charts and workspace layouts, and perform advanced options analysis. Read full review
Best for professionals
As our top pick for professionals in 2020, the Interactive Brokers Trader Workstation (TWS) platform offers programmable hotkeys and a slew of order types for placing every possible trade imaginable, including algorithmic orders. Popular among the institutional community, including hedge funds, Interactive Brokers isn't beginner-friendly but does offer the lowest margin rates in the industry. Just beware, Interactive Brokers requires a $100,000 minimum deposit for margin accounts. Read full review
As our top pick for professionals in 2020, the Interactive Brokers Trader Workstation (TWS) platform offers programmable hotkeys and a slew of order types for placing every possible trade imaginable, including algorithmic orders. Popular among the institutional community, including hedge funds, Interactive Brokers isn't beginner-friendly but does offer the lowest margin rates in the industry. Just beware, Interactive Brokers requires a $100,000 minimum deposit for margin accounts. Read full review
Best order execution
Fidelity was ranked first overall for order execution, providing traders industry-leading order fills alongside a competitive platform. For day traders, Active Trader Pro (ATP) is Fidelity’s flagship desktop platform, and includes several unique, in-house brewed tools, including Real-Time Analytics (streaming trade signals) and Trade Armor (real-time position analysis). Read full review
Fidelity was ranked first overall for order execution, providing traders industry-leading order fills alongside a competitive platform. For day traders, Active Trader Pro (ATP) is Fidelity’s flagship desktop platform, and includes several unique, in-house brewed tools, including Real-Time Analytics (streaming trade signals) and Trade Armor (real-time position analysis). Read full review
Best web-based platform
Built as a web-based platform, Power E*TRADE innovates and delivers speed, ease of use, and the tools needed for traders to succeed. Once again, in our 2020 Review, Power E*TRADE won our award, 'Best Web-Based Platform.' E*TRADE also took our top spot for options trading. Read full review
Built as a web-based platform, Power E*TRADE innovates and delivers speed, ease of use, and the tools needed for traders to succeed. Once again, in our 2020 Review, Power E*TRADE won our award, 'Best Web-Based Platform.' E*TRADE also took our top spot for options trading. Read full review
Day Trading Platform Features Comparison
Is there a specific feature you require for your trading? Popular tools used by day traders include ladder trading, level II quotes, trade hot keys, direct market routing, stock alerts, streaming time & sales, and strategy backtesting, among many others.
Lucky for you, StockBrokers.com operates the largest verified database on the web for online brokerages. For a deeper comparison of 150+ features, use our online brokerage comparison tool.
Feature | TradeStation Open Account | TD Ameritrade | Interactive Brokers | Fidelity |
Stock Alerts - Basic Fields | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Stock Alerts - Advanced Fields | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
Streaming Time & Sales | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
Streaming TV | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Direct Market Routing - Stocks | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Direct Market Routing - Options | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Ladder Trading | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
Trade Hot Keys | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Level 2 Quotes - Stocks | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Level 2 Quotes - Options | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Trade Ideas - Backtesting | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
Short Locator | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
Order Liquidity Rebates | Yes | No | Yes | No |
What is a day trading?
FINRA rules define a day trade as, 'The purchase and sale, or the sale and purchase, of the same security on the same day in a margin account. This definition encompasses any security, including options. Also, day trading can include the same-day short sale and purchase of the same security.'
Day trading is a strategy in which stock traders buy and sell throughout the day with a goal of making small profits with each trade. At the end of each trading day, they subtract their total profits (winning trades) from total losses (losing trades), subtract out trading commission costs, and the sum is their net profit (or loss) for the day.
How much money do I need to day trade?
To day trade, traders must maintain an account balance of at least $25,000 to comply with the Pattern Day Trader rule, which grants them access to 4:1 margin during the day. It is important to remember, day trading is risky.
What is a 'pattern day trader'?
FINRA rules define a pattern day trader as, 'Any customer who executes four or more 'day trades' within five business days, provided that the number of day trades represents more than six percent of the customer's total trades in the margin account for that same five-business-day period.'
Why does the pattern day trading rule require $25,000?
The SEC believes that while all forms of investing are risky, day trading is an especially high risk practice. The pattern day trader rule was said to be put in place to limit potential losses and protect the consumer.
As a result, the pattern day trader rule is enforced by every major US online brokerage, as according to law. The SEC believes that those whose account value is less than $25,000 are more likely to be less sophisticated traders. After the dot-com market crash, the SEC and FINRA decided that previous day trading rules did not properly address the inherent risks with day trading.
How do I choose a day trading platform?
All in all, finding the right platform for day trading first requires understanding the laws and making sure you have at least $25,000 for Pattern Day Trader status. https://hfsgpmb.weebly.com/how-to-delete-apps-from-mac-os.html. Next, ask yourself, “How important are low trading commissions?” and, “How important are tools?” Assume that lower trade costs usually mean less quality in such areas as research, trading tools, mobile trading apps, or ease of use. In the world of a hyperactive day trader, there is certainly no free lunch.
Which brokers offer market rebates for adding liquidity?
Interactive Brokers, Lightspeed, TradeStation, Cobra Trading, and SpeedTrader all offer what are known as “unbundled” rates, which means they pass 100% of all market rebates (or charges) for adding (or taking) liquidity back to their clients. Many market exchanges (examples include Citadel, Bats, and KCG (Virtu)) will pay your broker for routing your order to them. These rebates are usually no more than a tenth of a penny or two per share, but they add up. See: Order Execution Guide.
Using a broker such as Lightspeed, routing a 1,000-share buy limit order on the NYSE will currently net you $0.0014 per share. Lightspeed’s base rate is $.0045 per share, so the original $4.50 trade now becomes only $3.10, thanks to a $1.40 rebate from the NYSE. This represents a savings of 31 percent. Note, however, this goes both ways, as routing a straight market order to the NYSE instead would incur a charge of $.0027 per share, thus increasing the cost of the trade.
Read Next
Explore our other online trading guides:
Methodology
For the StockBrokers.com tenth annual best online brokers review published in January 2020, a total of 3,540 data points were collected over five months and used to score brokers. This makes StockBrokers.com home to the largest independent database on the web covering the online broker industry.
Participation is required to be included. Each broker completed an in-depth data profile and provided executive time (live in person or over the web) for an annual update meeting. Our rigorous data validation process yields an error rate of less than .001% each year, providing site visitors quality data they can trust. Learn more about how we test.
Participation is required to be included. Each broker completed an in-depth data profile and provided executive time (live in person or over the web) for an annual update meeting. Our rigorous data validation process yields an error rate of less than .001% each year, providing site visitors quality data they can trust. Learn more about how we test.
Still aren't sure which online broker to choose? Email us a question! Whether you are a beginner investor learning the ropes or a professional trader, we are here to help. Email us your online broker specific question and we will respond within one business day.
Traders are great at disagreeing. They disagree on everything from trading strategies to ways of measuring profitability. But there’s one thing that all successful traders agree on, and that is maintaining a trading journal that records your trades.
Why You Need A Trading Journal
Selwyn Gishen wrote a succinct article over at Investopedia on why you need a trading journal. It boils down to:
- Getting an idea of your historical performance
- Giving you a basis for your future trades
- Evaluating and fine-tuning your trading system
- Recognizing the need to change any destructive trading behavior
How To Choose Your Trading Journal Software
You might be a pen and paper person. But as you accumulate trade data, it becomes unfeasible to analyze them on paper. You need the help of a computer.
Hence, a trading journal software is mandatory.
When choosing your trading journal software, you need to consider the following:
- Trading Instruments (Stocks? Futures? Forex? or multiple instruments?)
- Brokerage (You can save time if your brokerage records are compatible with your software.)
- Trading Style (Trading horizon, frequency, objectives, etc.)
Regardless of your trading configuration, you will always face a trade-off between convenience and ease of customization.
Below, I’ve organized the top trading journal software into three sections.
- Dedicated Trading Journal Software
- General Purpose Software As Trading Journals
- Screen Recording For Recording Intraday Trading
#1: Dedicated Trading Journal Software
Specialized software packages that are well-suited for your trading needs are ideal. You can import your data and start analyzing them immediately. Mac pro taking forever to open apps. You will also find it easy to record new trades.
However, you will find them inflexible once your needs change.
All the programs here offer a free plan or trial. Be sure to test them before signing up.
TradeBench
TradeBench helps you calculate your position size and manage your risk. It comes with a dashboard and charts to help you visualize your progress.
If you’re looking for a basic no-frills solution, check out TradeBench.
It’s free for anyone who joins their mailing list. More details here.
Trading Diary Pro
![Best Best](/uploads/1/3/4/2/134258519/332828168.jpg)
This paid software has a bulk import function that works with dozens of brokers (full list here). It is ideal for anyone that uses their supported brokers and want to avoid manual data entry.
It also has a useful tagging function. You can create your tagging system so that you can filter your trades by any attributes.
Options traders will also find Trading Diary Pro helpful as it recognizes various options strategy.
Trading Diary Pro costs $149. Note that there’s an upgrade fee of $49 per year after the first year.
It offers a free 30-day trial. Click here to learn more.
Trademetria
Like Trading Diary Pro, Trademetria offers an import function for selected brokers. On top of that, it has all the essential trade journal functions like metrics dashboard and filtering. It also works for day traders.
Available for a recurring monthly fee.
Trading Journal Spreadsheet
Trading Journal Spreadsheet offers an intuitive and powerful trade journal tool. It leverages on Microsoft Excel’s advanced features to design a feature-filled trading journal software.
It supports multiple brokers, instruments, what-if analysis, and includes a position sizing tool as well.
You can get it with a one-time payment that is tiered according to the number of markets you would like to create journals for.
Edgewonk
Apps For Mac
Edgewonk is a trading journal the focuses on helping you find and analyze your trading edge. It is highly customizable and works for most instruments. (Cryptocurrency is a recent addition.)
Downloaded apps not opening on macbook. It also uses proprietary algorithms that make suggestions for improving your trading performance.
TraderSync
TraderSync is designed for stock traders. It summarizes your trade records into beautiful dashboards, complete with recommendations on how to trade better.
There is a free option, but only the paid plans give you smart feedback on your trading performance.
TradeInsights
TradeInsights is a free trading journal that works entirely online. Nothing to download. You can easily import your trades from a variety of platforms.
It has the essential functions for keeping a healthy trading journal and has an optional leaderboard that offers a social aspect to your journaling.
TradesViz
TradesViz is a well-polished trading journal that sets itself apart with its extensive visualization options.
Given its 200+ charts, you can insights into your trading results easily instead of meddling with an Excel spreadsheet.
This platform has dozens of functions, and you might feel overwhelmed at first. But no worries, to help with that, TradesViz generates critical insights from your trading records automatically to get you started.
The full-featured product starts at $15 per month. Before you subscribe, it’s a good idea to test-drive it with a free Basic plan.
#2: General Purpose Software As Trading Journals
Compared to the trading journal programs, you need to spend more time setting up general-purpose software (spreadsheet and note-taking software) to use them as trading journals.
The good news is, once you are proficient, there’s no limit on what you can record and analyze with them.
Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel is a powerful spreadsheet that has more functions than you’ll need for any trading journal.
Best Mac App Trading Platform App
You have complete control over what fields to include, their formatting, and how to analyze the trade records. This autonomy might be overwhelming, especially for new traders who are unfamiliar with spreadsheet programs. But for traders who are proficient with spreadsheet manipulation, I strongly encourage you to design a trading journal with Excel.
There are free alternatives like Google Sheets and Calc (OpenOffice). They will work for your trading journal as well, but you’ll find it easier to find resources helping you with Microsoft Excel.
For a starting point on what fields to include in your Excel journal, check out these resources:
To make the most out of a spreadsheet trading journal, align it with your trading approach.
For instance, in my price action course, the included Excel Toolkit has sections that correspond to different parts of the course trading framework.
Evernote
Evernote is a robust note-taking software. It excels at connecting pieces of information in a friendly manner.
If you’ve given serious thought to journalling your trades, you’ll realize that each trade has many moving parts. For each trade, you have your analysis, your chart screenshot, your trading results, trade confirmations, emotions journal, etc.
But no worries, Evernote will help you keep track of them.
Want to see how it works as a trading journal? Hugh Kimura over at Trading Heroes shows you how he uses Evernote as his forex trading journal.
#3: Screen Recording For Intraday Traders
Screen recording software is useful for intraday traders. They record your trading sessions and allow you to replay them for post-trade analysis.
They cannot replace a trading journal as you still need your trade records in a database (table) for performance analysis. But for intraday traders, screen recording can form a valuable part of your trading journal.
- My Screen Recorder – A lightweight Windows software that trader Mike Bellafiore uses to record his trading screens.
- Camstudio – For those looking for a bare-bones screen recording software, look no further. Check Camstudio – a free software released under the GPL.
- Video Trade Recorder For MetaTrader – If MetaTrader (MT4 or MT5) is your only charting and trading platform, this is a great option. It runs with MetaTrader in the background and can record multiple chart screens (including those minimized). A low price tag of $35.
- Camtasia by TechSmith – This is one of the best programs you can get for recording your screen, but it does not come cheap. ($249)
- SnagIt by TechSmith – This is a lighter software that works well for recording your trading sessions. ($49.95)
The same company created Camtasia and SnagIt, but their features overlap. This is a source of confusion. But based on TechSmith’s clarification on this page, SnagIt is suitable for documenting your trading sessions. But if you are recording for an audience and require a more polished product, you should go for Camtasia.
Want to share your screen recordings with your trading buddies? Camtasia and SnagIt users can check out Screencast – an online service for sharing your screen recordings seamlessly.
Before You Take Out Your Wallet
![Platform Platform](/uploads/1/3/4/2/134258519/817502248.png)
Check if your charting platform has an integrated trade journal. It could just be the seamless solution you need.
Examples
- NinjaTrader has a trade performance report that provides summary statistics and a field for trade journalling.
- Forex Tester 3 (only for simulation trading) has similar functions.
Show me a trader with good records and I’ll show you a good trader.
– Dr. Alexander Elder, author of The New Trading For A Living