Prop Firm Challenge Simulator
Free prop firm challenge calculator: what a simple three-field simulator predicts versus what each firm’s real published rules produce, for the same trader.
Prop firms sell the dream of a funded account, but the challenge is a statistics test with a fee attached. Pick your firm below and you get two numbers for the same trader: what a simple three-field calculator predicts, and what that firm’s full published rule set actually produces. On most evaluations the simple one is far too optimistic — by more than 40 percentage points on some — and on one it is too harsh.
QuantDojo · Free tool
Prop Firm Challenge Simulator
What are your odds of passing a prop firm challenge? Pick your firm and see two answers: what a simple three-field simulator says, and what the firm’s actual published rules say for the same trader. They are rarely close. Usually the simple one is far too optimistic — and where a firm’s rule is kinder than it assumes, it is wrong the other way.
(target, total loss, daily loss)
(everything they publish)
Both columns are the same trader: . Both are simulated attempts. The only difference is the rule book. Rule sets were read on each firm’s own page on ; firms change them often, so re-check before you pay.
| Evaluation | Simple model | Real rules | Difference |
|---|
Why this page shows numbers instead of a calculator. It used to run the simulation in your browser. That was worse in two ways. It could only model the three headline numbers, so it was confidently wrong by the margins in the table above — and because the model sat in the page, the answer it gave depended on which numbers you happened to type, with no way to tell a plausible answer from a misleading one. These figures are computed once, against rule sets we have read first-hand, and published with the date.
Two evaluations can land on exactly the same number, and that is not an error. Risking 2% per trade, three losing trades in a row put you at −2.00%, then −3.96%, then −5.88%. A 4% daily loss limit and a 5% one both sit inside that last step, so the same third loss breaches both: for this trader they are literally the same rule. It is a useful thing to know before paying more for a ‘safer’ limit that your position size cannot actually reach.
Educational tool — not financial advice, and not affiliated with, and receives no commission for, any firm’s rules shown here. (Where we do earn a commission, the page carrying the link says so.) Both columns assume independent trades with fixed win and loss sizes; real trading has streaks, fat tails, slippage and emotion, so treat every figure here as an optimistic ceiling rather than a forecast. Probabilities are frequencies out of a finite number of simulated attempts and are capped at >99% / <1%, because no real challenge is ever a certainty. A difference of zero means a three-field model happens to be right for that evaluation, and a plus sign means it was too harsh — we show both, because a comparison that only ever went our way would not be worth reading.
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How to use the prop firm challenge calculator
Pick your firm's evaluation from the list. You get two numbers for the same trader: what a simple three-field simulator predicts, and what that firm's actual published rules produce. The gap between them is the point of this page.
Both columns run the identical trader — 45% winners at 2:1 reward-to-risk, three trades a day, 2% of the account at risk per trade, three months to pass — through 40,000 simulated attempts. The only thing that changes is the rule book. A simple simulator knows three numbers: the profit target, the max total loss and the max daily loss. Everything else it has to assume, and nearly every assumption it makes is the flattering one. It assumes the loss limit sits on your starting balance rather than trailing your equity. It assumes one phase, when passing an evaluation twice is not the same as passing it once. It ignores minimum trading days and consistency caps.
Those omissions are not small. On FundedNext's Stellar 2-Step a three-field model predicts 63% and the real rules give 21%. On FTMO's 2-Step it is 58% against 26%. Several evaluations come out roughly twice as passable as they really are. Two come out exactly right, and two come out wrong in the opposite direction — both futures programs whose daily loss limit only ends the session instead of failing the attempt, which a three-field model has no choice but to treat as fatal. At 2% risk that limit is a single losing trade, so the simple model rates Topstep's Combine at 29% against a real 47%, and FundedNext's Futures Rapid Daily at 29% against a real 58%. We show all of it, because a table that only ever proves our point would not be worth reading.
The lesson underneath: the challenge is rarely lost at the profit target, it is lost at the loss limits. Over-risking a genuinely good edge can halve your pass rate, because a normal losing streak trips the daily or total loss rule long before the edge compounds to the target. Lowering risk per trade usually moves the number more than chasing a higher win rate — the same lesson behind risk of ruin and position sizing. Finding the size that actually maximises your odds under your firm's full rule set is what the Prop Firm Pass Plan computes.
Frequently asked questions
What is a good pass rate for a prop firm challenge?
There is no official number, but industry estimates put the share of buyers who ever pass in the low single digits to low double digits. That is not because the targets are impossible — it is because most challenge-takers combine a marginal edge with too much risk per trade, so a routine losing streak trips a drawdown limit. The table above shows why the published estimates feel low compared with what a quick calculator tells you: the quick calculator is modelling an easier challenge than the one you bought.
Why do most traders fail the challenge?
Not at the profit target — at the loss limits. A max daily loss and a max total loss act as a gauntlet: even a positive-expectancy strategy has a meaningful chance of hitting a bad run early and breaching a limit before the edge compounds to the target. The two biggest levers are your real expectancy and your risk per trade. Halving risk per trade often does more for your pass rate than a higher win rate.
What win rate do I need to pass a prop firm challenge?
It depends on your reward-to-risk, not win rate alone. A 40% win rate at 2:1 has a real edge; a 60% win rate at 0.5:1 does not. What matters is expectancy per trade combined with risk size relative to the drawdown limits — which is why the same trader on this page ranges from 21% to 60% depending only on whose rules they are trading under.
Why does this page show fixed numbers instead of letting me enter my own?
Because the version that let you enter your own was quietly misleading. It ran the simulation in your browser, which meant it could only ever model the three headline numbers — so it was confidently wrong by the margins in the table above, with nothing on screen to tell you so. Fixed numbers computed against rule sets we have read first-hand, published with the date they were read, are a more honest answer than a calculator that cannot see most of the rules. For your own win rate, R multiple and risk size under your firm's complete rule set, that is what the Prop Firm Pass Plan is for.
Is the challenge fee worth it?
Work it backwards from an honest pass probability. At 21% you should expect to buy roughly five attempts on average before clearing one, so the real price of the opportunity is five fees, not one. That is the arithmetic a too-optimistic simulator hides: quote 63% instead of 21% and the same challenge looks like 1.6 attempts. If the maths only works at a pass probability you cannot actually achieve, that is your answer.
Does passing the challenge mean my strategy is profitable?
No — and this is the trap. A challenge can be passed by an overfit or lucky strategy, and that same strategy then blows the funded account, where the payout is on the line. Passing proves you cleared a threshold once; it does not prove the edge is real. Before you trust it with a funded account, test whether the edge survives out-of-sample. Check it free with quantcheck.
Does this model trailing drawdowns and minimum trading days?
Yes — that is exactly the difference between the two columns. The "real rules" figure models the max loss as each firm actually measures it (from the starting balance, trailing your highest equity, trailing your highest daily close, or trailing and then locking at break-even), both phases of a two-phase evaluation, minimum trading days, consistency caps on your best day, and whether hitting the daily limit fails you or merely ends the session. The "simple model" figure deliberately models none of it. Both still assume independent trades with fixed win and loss sizes, so treat every number here as an optimistic ceiling rather than a forecast.