Risk of ruin is the chance a losing run drains your equity before the edge has time to work. The calculator estimates that chance, and this page is honest about the one input that controls it.
The Idea
Edge tells you the long-run direction. Risk of ruin tells you whether you survive the short run to get there.
Risk of ruin is the probability that a string of losses takes your account down to a level you treat as wiped out, before your positive expectancy has time to play out. In real trading that level is a deep drawdown, not a literal zero.
It depends on three things together: how often you win, how big your winners are versus your losers, and how much of the account you stake on each trade. A profitable edge with too much risk per trade can still ruin you.
The catch is variance. Even a winning system goes through losing runs, and a run that is deep enough ends the game before the average can save you. That is the honest part most risk pages skip.
Free Calculator
Enter your win rate, reward to risk and the percentage you stake per trade. The result is a simulation, not a guarantee.
Risk of Ruin Calculator
Ruin is set at a 50% account drawdown. Position size is fixed-fractional, recalculated on current equity every trade.
Ruin here means a 50% account drawdown. It is a Monte Carlo estimate over fixed-fractional sizing. ruin = equity ≤ 0.5 of start
The Honest Part
Ruin is rarely a zero balance. It is the point where the account is so deep in a hole that recovery stops being realistic.
Fixed-fractional sizing never reaches exactly zero, because you only ever risk a slice of what is left. So ruin is defined as a 50% fall in equity, the depth most accounts do not come back from.
Risk of ruin depends on win rate, reward to risk and position size together. A strong edge sized too aggressively still hits the drawdown threshold.
Win rate and reward to risk are slow to change. The one input you fully control today is how much you stake per trade, and it moves risk of ruin faster than anything else.
Estimate vs Real
A simulation assumes a stable win rate and reward to risk. Your real account shows the drawdown that actually happened, which is the number that matters.
Built automatically from synced broker trades, including every losing run a single risk of ruin number can only average over.
See your actual win rate and reward to risk, so the inputs you would guess here are replaced by the numbers you really produced.
Your worst peak to trough fall shown next to the curve, so you see how close you really came to the ruin threshold.
Supported Platforms
Connect your account and the equity curve is built automatically from then on. No CSV files, no imports.
cTrader
Connects via the official cTrader API. Full history imports on connection and the equity curve updates on every trade.
Learn about cTrader → 14-day free trial included
Bybit
Connects via read-only API key (Bybit Global). Equity tracked on Perpetuals and Spot, synced every 2 hours.
Learn about Bybit → 14-day free trial included
OANDA
Connects via the OANDA API. Forex, indices, commodities and metals with the equity curve tracked from connection.
Learn about OANDA → 14-day free trial included
MetaTrader 4 & MT5
Connects via API to any MT4 or MT5 broker. No plugins and no CSV exports - the equity curve is built automatically.
Learn about MetaTrader → Requires a paid planFAQ
Risk of ruin is the probability that a trading account loses enough to be considered wiped out before the edge has time to play out. In practice ruin is defined as a large drawdown, such as a 50% fall in equity, rather than a literal zero balance. It depends on win rate, reward to risk and how much you stake per trade.
This calculator runs a Monte Carlo simulation. It plays thousands of sequences of trades using your win rate and reward to risk, sizing each trade as a fixed fraction of current equity. It counts how often equity falls 50% before the run ends and reports that share as the risk of ruin.
Most traders treat anything under 5% as acceptable and under 1% as very safe. A risk of ruin above 20% means a 50% drawdown is likely even with a positive edge, usually because position size is too large for the win rate and reward to risk.
The fastest lever is position size. Risking less per trade lowers the depth of any losing run, which lowers the chance of hitting the drawdown threshold. Improving win rate or reward to risk also helps, but those are slower to change than the percentage you stake.
Yes. Tracker Fx includes a 14-day free trial with full access to all journaling and analytics features. The free trial is available for all platforms except MetaTrader, which requires a paid plan.
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