ProjectX FAQ: 72+ Answers on Futures, Prop Firms & TradingView Automation

Yes. PickMyTrade connects TradingView webhooks to ProjectX-powered accounts (TopstepX and remaining ProjectX prop firm partners) through the ProjectX API. You create a TradingView alert, point the webhook URL at PickMyTrade, and every fired alert is translated into a live order on your ProjectX account in under a second. No Pine-to-broker coding is needed.

Log in to your prop firm portal (e.g., topstepx.com), open the API section, and generate an API key. Then in your PickMyTrade dashboard add a new connection, select ProjectX / TopstepX, paste the API key plus your prop firm username, and save. The setup wizard walks through it in roughly 3 minutes.

Yes — ProjectX exposes a REST API plus WebSocket streams for order placement, account data and market data, authenticated with JWT tokens issued from an API key. Access is typically gated behind a small monthly fee (around $29/month via the dashboard at the time of writing) and has to be enabled by the prop firm for your account.

The in-platform experience supports Position Brackets and Auto-OCO Brackets, but the API integration is more limited — ProjectX does not support server-side bracket orders in the way Tradovate does. PickMyTrade works around this by tracking one SL and one TP per symbol and sending them as separate orders; any new alert in the same direction overwrites the previous SL/TP values.

TradingView fires an alert with a JSON payload → PickMyTrade receives it on a unique webhook URL → PickMyTrade validates the payload, applies your risk/position rules, and sends the order to ProjectX over the authenticated API → ProjectX routes the order to the exchange through your prop firm account. Fills and rejections stream back to PickMyTrade in real time.

Yes — any TradingView strategy or indicator that can fire an alert can drive ProjectX orders through PickMyTrade. You set 'Alert on order fills' on a strategy (or a custom condition on an indicator), paste the PickMyTrade webhook URL, and every generated signal hits your ProjectX account with your configured contract size, SL and TP.

All CME-group futures available on your prop firm plan — the E-minis (ES, NQ, YM, RTY), micros (MES, MNQ, MYM, M2K), energies (CL, NG), metals (GC, SI), grains, and bonds. The contract you can actually trade depends on what your specific prop firm enables (some block certain products around news).

End-to-end latency is typically under one second from alert fire to order accepted at the exchange — most of that is TradingView's outbound webhook delay, not ProjectX execution. PickMyTrade itself adds millisecond-level overhead, and ProjectX fills on CME tend to settle well inside 100ms once the order reaches the router.

Yes. In PickMyTrade you can set SL/TP in ticks, points, dollars, or percent, and they are attached automatically to every alert hitting ProjectX. Because ProjectX does not broker-side support full bracket orders, PickMyTrade manages the SL/TP as working orders and updates them as the position changes.

Yes. PickMyTrade lets you fire a single TradingView alert into multiple ProjectX accounts (for example, several TopstepX combines plus a funded account) with per-account contract sizing and risk rules. This is especially useful for prop traders running evaluations and funded accounts in parallel.

Automation itself is allowed by most ProjectX-using prop firms, but your bot still has to respect the rules — daily loss limits, trailing drawdown, max contract size, news-trading windows and consistency rules. PickMyTrade's risk panel lets you set hard caps on contracts per alert and daily loss so an alert storm can't blow up an account.

Yes — the ProjectX API exposes per-account order placement, which is enough for third-party copier tools (including PickMyTrade) to mirror signals from a master to follower accounts. Most prop firms require copier users to disclose it and forbid copying across accounts owned by different people for arbitrage reasons.

Technically yes — ProjectX accepts rapid market and limit orders — but most ProjectX prop firms (Topstep, TickTickTrader, Tradeify, etc.) have anti-HFT / consistency rules that flag very high order rates or scalps held only a few seconds. Review the specific firm's rulebook before deploying a high-frequency scalper.

Yes, both natively and via PickMyTrade. ProjectX supports auto-liquidation and profit/loss-based lockouts in its risk settings, and PickMyTrade has a Flatten/Close-All action you can schedule from TradingView alerts or a time rule — useful for respecting the daily close-out windows on TopstepX and other ProjectX firms.

Yes. PickMyTrade supports a 'reverse' action that closes the existing position and opens the opposite side in one webhook. On ProjectX this is handled as two sequential orders (flatten + new entry) because ProjectX doesn't expose a single reversal primitive on the API.

Yes. PickMyTrade lets you express contract size as fixed, per-alert variable, or as a function of account balance, and it reads your ProjectX account balance over the API so sizing can scale with drawdown or growth. This keeps bots inside the TopstepX scaling plan without manual babysitting.

No — PickMyTrade is fully no-code. You configure the strategy, contract, SL, TP and sizing in the dashboard, TradingView fires the alert, and PickMyTrade does the translation to ProjectX's API. Developers who want more control can alternatively use the raw ProjectX API (project-x-py SDK, REST, WebSocket) to build custom bots.

Yes. PickMyTrade supports trailing stop logic and will update the ProjectX stop order as price moves. Because ProjectX does not fully broker-side trail over the API, PickMyTrade computes the trail server-side and replaces the stop order on ProjectX whenever the trail crosses a tick.

Yes. TopstepX is the Topstep-branded build of ProjectX, and PickMyTrade treats it as a first-class broker on pickmytrade.io. You pick TopstepX in the connections list, paste the ProjectX API key issued from the TopstepX dashboard, and your TradingView alerts route straight into your Combine or Express Funded Account.

Orders will fail at the broker leg and PickMyTrade will surface the rejection with the ProjectX error code. Because TopstepX / ProjectX had notable outages in late 2025, a good practice is to define a max-retry and a max-daily-loss in PickMyTrade so a reconnection burst can't flood the exchange once ProjectX comes back online.

Yes. Each TradingView alert carries its own payload, and PickMyTrade can route several strategies into the same ProjectX account with per-strategy tags and risk rules. Just make sure the combined contract size on any symbol stays inside the scaling plan your prop firm allows.

ProjectX wraps the dashboard with standard authentication and many prop firms require 2FA on the portal, but the API itself authenticates via an API key and short-lived JWT token rather than a second factor. Treat the API key as a credential, never commit it to code, rotate it periodically, and revoke it from the ProjectX settings if your automation tool is retired.

Yes — run the backtest inside TradingView's Strategy Tester as usual, then attach the PickMyTrade webhook to the same strategy and switch 'Alert on order fills' on. You can also paper-trade first by pointing the webhook at a TopstepX evaluation account rather than a funded one.

You can't sign up to ProjectX directly as a retail trader. Access is provided by a prop firm that has licensed the platform (primarily TopstepX in 2026, with a handful of legacy partners still transitioning). You buy an evaluation or funded plan from that firm and receive ProjectX credentials as part of onboarding.

TopstepX is the flagship and, after February 28, 2026, effectively the exclusive ProjectX firm. Firms that historically offered ProjectX — Bulenox, TickTickTrader, Tradeify, Alpha Futures, Lucid, Blue Guardian Futures, Top One Futures, TX3 Funding, Hola Prime Futures, DayTraders, Goat Funded Futures — are migrating to Tradovate Prop or Rithmic-based stacks.

Each prop firm has its own ProjectX sub-URL (e.g., topstepx.projectx.com, tickticktrader.projectx.com, bulenox.projectx.com). You log in with the username and email the firm assigned at purchase — not a generic projectx.com account. If a login fails on one sub-URL, double-check you're on the correct firm URL.

Pick a plan at topstep.com (Combine or Express Funded), pay the one-time evaluation fee plus monthly platform fee where applicable, and receive a TopstepX login by email. Log in at topstepx.com, verify the account, accept the risk rules, and you're live on ProjectX infrastructure.

Yes — most ProjectX prop firms let you hold multiple Combines and funded accounts. TopstepX allows up to a limit set per customer (historically around 5–10 accounts). Rules like consistency and copy-trading disclosure apply across all of them, so automate with care.

Yes — ProjectX is browser-based and works worldwide, subject to each prop firm's eligibility list. Most ProjectX firms accept traders from most countries except a short sanctioned list; the firm (not ProjectX) determines country eligibility.

With ProjectX going TopStep-exclusive on February 28, 2026, firms that previously offered it are migrating users to Tradovate, Rithmic or another back end. You typically keep the funded account but log in on a different platform after the cutover; check your firm's migration announcement for the exact date and data retention.

ProjectX has no retail price list — it's licensed to prop firms, and each firm bundles the platform into its plan fees. In practice you pay the firm's evaluation fee plus any monthly platform or data subscription; ProjectX itself is usually 'free' to the trader as part of that bundle.

ProjectX itself doesn't set commissions; your prop firm does. TopstepX, for example, advertises zero commissions on its TopstepX-native accounts. Legacy ProjectX firms typically charged round-turn commissions similar to other futures brokers (often $0.35–$1.00 per side on micros/e-minis).

CME market data is usually bundled with the platform fee on ProjectX, but some firms break it out. TopstepX advertised a CME data waiver that saves roughly $133/month compared with running the same feed under a retail account — treat 'is data included?' as the right question to ask your specific firm.

Where a prop firm enables ProjectX API access, it's typically a small add-on — around $29/month at the time of writing, billed through the prop firm dashboard. Some firms include it on higher-tier plans. Check the API settings page in your firm's ProjectX portal for the exact price.

No. PickMyTrade is a flat $50/month for unlimited accounts, strategies and trades across all supported brokers, including ProjectX / TopstepX. There's a free trial, and the ProjectX API fee charged by your prop firm is separate.

ProjectX itself doesn't process payouts — your prop firm does. Most firms (TopstepX, TickTickTrader, TradeDayX, Lucid) offer free payouts via bank, Wise, Deel or crypto, but some charge wire or currency conversion fees. Minimum thresholds typically sit around $100–$250.

The main recurring costs are the monthly Combine or platform fee and, where applicable, the API add-on. Reset fees on failed Combines are the most commonly overlooked line item. Read the firm's billing page before purchasing and confirm whether a plan includes CME data or charges it separately.

ProjectX charges $29/month for API access, which is required for any third-party automation tool (including PickMyTrade) to connect to your ProjectX or TopstepX account. Topstep traders get a 50% discount code, bringing it to ~$14.50/month. This is a separate charge paid directly to ProjectX — it is not included in PickMyTrade's $50/month subscription.

Your total cost for full TradingView-to-TopstepX automation is: PickMyTrade ($50/month) + ProjectX API ($14.50-$29/month) + TradingView with webhooks (from $14.95/month for Essential). That's roughly $79-$94/month total for a complete no-code automation stack that supports unlimited strategies, unlimited trades, and multi-account execution. Many traders find this pays for itself within the first few profitable automated trades on a funded account. PickMyTrade handles all API communication, authentication, order routing, and error handling — you just set up your TradingView alerts and connect your account.

ProjectX embeds TradingView's Advanced Charts, so you get the same chart engine most retail traders already know — hundreds of indicators and drawing tools, multi-timeframe, Renko, Heikin Ashi, Kagi, Point & Figure, Bars, Candles and Line types. Charts sit right next to the DOM and order panel in-platform.

Yes. ProjectX has a full DOM with 1-click trading, advanced order staging, and depth visualization for futures contracts. Hundreds of price levels of depth are available on the ladder, updating at millisecond cadence.

Market, Limit, Stop Market, Stop Limit, Trailing Stop, OCO and bracket orders (both Position Brackets and Auto-OCO Brackets). Bracket brackets come in two flavors — Position Brackets that track the whole position and Auto-OCO Brackets that attach a fresh SL/TP to each entry.

There's no dedicated app store download — ProjectX is a progressive web app you load in your mobile browser. Functionally the mobile build keeps TradingView charts, the DOM, the order ticket and performance metrics, with buy/sell/limit/stop/trailing orders all available.

No — ProjectX is entirely browser-based. There is nothing to install on Windows or macOS; you log in at your prop firm's sub-URL and the full trading interface renders in the browser. That's a deliberate design choice (easier for prop firms to manage than installing Rithmic or NinjaTrader on user machines).

ProjectX ships with configurable max daily loss, daily profit targets, position-size caps, auto-liquidation at a loss threshold, and a manual lockout button that blocks you out of new trades for the session. On TopstepX there's also the proprietary Tilt sentiment indicator.

Yes — workspaces are saveable, with adjustable chart/DOM/order-panel layouts, multiple accounts in tabs, customizable hotkeys and order-defaults per symbol. Layouts sync to your login so they persist across devices.

No — ProjectX is the trading platform; all funding flows (evaluation fees, funded-account payouts, reset fees) go through the prop firm that issued your account. ProjectX never touches trader money directly.

It varies by firm. TopstepX advertises payouts processed within 12–24 hours for crypto and 1–2 business days for bank. TradeDayX and Lucid also target 1–2 business day payouts. Expect international wires to add 3–5 days on top.

Most ProjectX firms support bank wire/ACH, Deel, Wise, and (increasingly) crypto (USDT, USDC). Some also offer PayPal. The exact list depends on the firm and your country.

You keep 100% of the first $10,000 in profits on a Live Funded Account, and then 90% of profits after that (Topstep keeps 10%). Express Funded Accounts cap each payout at 50% of balance or $5,000, whichever is smaller, until you qualify for the Live Funded Account.

Each firm sets its own scaling plan — on TopstepX, for example, your max contract size grows with the account balance per the published scaling tiers, and it resets if you draw down past certain thresholds. The scaling plan is enforced inside ProjectX's risk engine, not just on paper.

No. Payouts on ProjectX firms are requested from the firm's portal (not ProjectX directly), and they're reviewed by the risk team before release. Neither ProjectX's API nor PickMyTrade can initiate a withdrawal on your behalf — that's deliberate, for obvious security reasons.

ProjectX is operated by a futures-technology provider and is used by regulated-adjacent prop firms handling simulated and live capital. The platform enforces session tokens (JWT), per-firm login domains, and server-side risk controls. That said, platform stability had public issues in late 2025 — the security posture is solid, but reliability is what you should evaluate.

Two-factor authentication availability depends on the prop firm's ProjectX build — TopstepX supports 2FA on the account portal, and most firms require it before generating API keys. The raw API itself uses an API key + JWT rather than a second factor, so guard the key as a credential.

PickMyTrade stores your API credentials encrypted on secure servers and uses them only to send orders and read account data on your behalf. The key never leaves PickMyTrade in plaintext and you can revoke it instantly from your ProjectX dashboard if you ever stop using automation.

No. The ProjectX API scope is order placement and account read-only data — it does not include withdrawals. PickMyTrade only submits and manages orders; withdrawals must be requested from your prop firm's portal.

Yes. Each prop firm has its own ProjectX tenancy (separate login URL, separate API scope), and inside a tenancy accounts are isolated. One trader can't see another's positions or orders, and prop firm admins only see their own firm's data.

Log in to your prop firm's ProjectX dashboard, open the API settings, and either delete the specific key or rotate it. The old key stops authenticating instantly, which kills any external automation attached to it — do this any time you switch tools or share login credentials.

PickMyTrade supports TopstepX (the flagship ProjectX build) plus the ProjectX-powered accounts at remaining partner firms that are still live. Setup is the same across firms — pick the firm in the connections list, drop in the ProjectX API key issued by that firm, and route TradingView alerts to it.

Classic Topstep ran on third-party platforms (NinjaTrader, Tradovate, TradingView). TopstepX is Topstep's own ProjectX-built platform that became the default in 2025 and, as of August 1, 2025, the required platform for new Combines and Resets. It bundles CME data, TradingView charts and proprietary tools like the Tilt indicator into a single web app.

TickTickTrader historically offered ProjectX as one of its platform options and still has a branded portal (tickticktrader.projectx.com). With the Feb 28, 2026 third-party sunset, TickTickTrader — like other firms — is transitioning funded traders to Tradovate/Rithmic-based alternatives; check TickTickTrader's current site for the latest status.

Following the February 28, 2026 third-party discontinuation, firms that were sunsetting or have already moved off ProjectX include Bulenox, TickTickTrader, Tradeify, Alpha Futures, Lucid Trading, Blue Guardian Futures, Top One Futures, TX3 Funding, Hola Prime Futures, DayTraders and Goat Funded Futures. Status changes quickly — confirm with each firm.

Yes. PickMyTrade natively supports both ProjectX/TopstepX and Tradovate, so you can keep the same TradingView strategies and repoint them at whichever broker your funded account ends up on. If a firm moves you off ProjectX, swap the connection in PickMyTrade to the new broker — the TradingView alerts and strategy logic don't need to change.

The TopstepX migration (July 2025) moved all new Topstep accounts to the proprietary TopstepX platform — removing support for NinjaTrader, Tradovate, and direct TradingView integration. This caused significant backlash on Reddit as traders saw their automation workflows break overnight. However, automation is still possible.

TopstepX (powered by ProjectX) now offers a dedicated REST API ($29/month, with a 50% discount code for Topstep traders). PickMyTrade fully supports TopstepX/ProjectX automation — you connect your TopstepX account to PickMyTrade, set up your TradingView webhook alerts, and PickMyTrade routes your signals through the ProjectX API to execute on your TopstepX account. No need to manage the API yourself, no coding required. This works for both Combine (evaluation) and funded accounts. PickMyTrade also supports multi-account execution, so you can run the same TradingView strategy across multiple TopstepX funded accounts simultaneously. If you have legacy Topstep accounts still on Tradovate, PickMyTrade supports those too — making it the only platform that covers both old and new Topstep infrastructure. All for $50/month flat, unlimited trades and strategies.

Make sure you're on the correct firm-specific URL (topstepx.projectx.com vs tickticktrader.projectx.com etc — they're not interchangeable), that you're using the username the firm assigned (not always your email), and that your account is still active and hasn't been liquidated. Clear cookies and try an incognito window before opening a support ticket.

Check that the API add-on is actually enabled on your prop firm account (some require a separate monthly subscription), that the API key hasn't expired or been rotated, and that you're hitting your firm's sub-domain rather than the generic ProjectX API. If all three look right, regenerate the key from the ProjectX dashboard and update it in PickMyTrade.

Most rejections are risk-rule related: hitting the daily loss limit, breaching trailing drawdown, exceeding the scaling-plan contract limit, or trading a product blocked by the firm (e.g., news-time halts). PickMyTrade surfaces the ProjectX error code directly — match it against the firm's rulebook and your current account metrics.

Users reported significant stability issues across late 2025 (ghost orders, desynced market data, failed stop-losses), and TopStep's CEO publicly committed to a January 2026 fix deadline. Hardwire your connection, disable heavy browser extensions, and if you rely on stop-losses for prop compliance consider running PickMyTrade as a second layer so server-side stops fire even if the browser hangs.

Auto-liquidation fires when you breach a hard risk rule — daily loss limit, trailing drawdown, or max-contract cap — or when a manual lockout was triggered. Topstep clarifies that hitting the daily loss limit isn't a rule violation per se, it's a forced break; the account is locked out until the next session.

It means the ProjectX API didn't return a valid response inside the retry window. Check the ProjectX status page or your firm's Discord for an outage, verify your API key is still active, and confirm you haven't hit a rate limit (heavy bot activity can). Re-saving the connection in PickMyTrade forces a fresh token exchange.

Rithmic is a low-level, broker-neutral execution infrastructure with ultra-low latency that pros use directly via clients like R|Trader Pro. ProjectX is a higher-level, browser-based platform built for prop firms, with TradingView charts, risk rules and a trader-friendly UI baked in. Choose Rithmic if you want raw speed and a third-party client ecosystem; choose ProjectX if you want a single hosted platform with prop-firm rules enforced in-app.

Tradovate is now the default multi-prop-firm platform, with support across Apex, Topstep (legacy), Take Profit Trader and many more. ProjectX, after going TopStep-exclusive on Feb 28, 2026, is effectively a single-firm platform. If you trade with TopstepX, ProjectX gives you the smoothest experience; if you spread across multiple firms, Tradovate is more portable.

NinjaTrader is a feature-heavy desktop application with a deep ecosystem (add-ons, custom indicators, ATM strategies) and works across multiple prop firms through CQG/Rithmic. ProjectX is lighter, browser-only, and enforces prop-firm rules server-side, which some traders prefer for discipline. ProjectX wins on setup simplicity; NinjaTrader wins on customizability.

Independent slippage and speed tests in 2025 showed Rithmic edging both on raw execution latency, Tradovate around sub-50ms fills on cloud infrastructure, and ProjectX competitive in the same neighborhood with its CME routing. Differences are usually immaterial for manual and swing traders; they matter for scalpers.

Yes. PickMyTrade is broker-agnostic and natively supports Tradovate, Rithmic, ProjectX/TopstepX, plus IB, TradeStation, TradeLocker and more. You can run the same TradingView strategy into a Rithmic account, a Tradovate prop account and a TopstepX account in parallel, with per-connection contract sizing and risk rules.