Topstep rules explained: the Maximum Loss Limit and the consistency target
Topstep is a futures account whose drawdown line moves once a day but is watched every second. Most traders who fail it misread one half of that sentence: they either fear an intraday spike that cannot hurt them, or ignore an open loser that can.
Prop firms change their terms, and rules differ by plan size, phase and promotion. Topstep’s own rules page is authoritative — always check it against the plan you hold before you trade.
Topstep at a glance
Where a row says “set per plan size”, the firm states that limit in dollars per account rather than as a single percentage — read it off your own account and enter it when you set the account up.
Two rules define a Topstep account. The Maximum Loss Limit trails your end-of-day balance, and the daily loss limit counts open positions too. Both are checked in real time against your live equity, so an unrealized swing can end an account that never booked a loss — even though the line itself only moves at the close.
How the trailing floor actually works
A trailing drawdown is a floor that follows your account upward and never comes back down. At Topstep it is recalculated from the balance you close the day at: a new end-of-day high pulls it up behind you, and a losing day does not lower it again. What happens inside the session does not move the line. It only decides whether you touch it.
Take a hypothetical $50,000 account with a $2,500 trailing floor, so it starts at $47,500. A trade runs to +$1,500 unrealized and you let it come back to close the day at +$200. The floor moves up to $47,700, measured from where you closed and not from the peak, so you still have $2,500 of room. Now the bad version: a position sits $2,600 underwater at lunch. It does not matter that you meant to hold it into the afternoon. Live equity touched the floor, and the account is gone.
The floor stops rising once it reaches your starting balance, and everything you make above that is buffer you cannot lose back to the trail. That single sentence should shape how you size in the first weeks: while the floor is still trailing, every green close you later give back is room you do not get back, and once it locks, a losing week costs you profit instead of account. Traders who understand this trade smaller before the lock and can afford to breathe after it.
The daily loss limit counts what is still open
The daily loss is measured on live equity, which means a position that is deep underwater consumes your daily room while you are still holding it, hoping it comes back. It does not wait for you to take the loss. The limit itself is set by your plan size rather than as a fixed percentage, so read it off your own account and enter it when you set the account up.
The trading day rolls at 5:00 p.m. America/Chicago. Futures firms reset around the close of the CME session rather than at midnight, so an evening trade often belongs to tomorrow's limit. Convert the reset into your own timezone once and write it down; guessing at it in the moment is how a "flat for the day" trade turns into a breach.
The 55% rule and what it does to a big day
In the Trading Combine, no single day may be worth more than 55% of your total profit. This is not a rule you break by losing — it is a rule you break by winning too much at once, and it is measured as a ratio, so the way out of a breach is never to undo the good day. It is to keep trading normally until the rest of your profit catches up.
The practical effect is that a huge day early in the Combine is a mixed blessing: it moves you toward the profit target and away from being allowed to pass. If your best day is already close to 55% of the total, the correct response is smaller size and more days, not a bigger swing to "balance it out" — and it is worth knowing exactly how much more profit the account needs before the ratio clears, rather than guessing.
Trading days, payouts and the split
There is no minimum number of days to pass the Combine, and 5 qualifying days before a payout on the Standard payout path. A day counts only if it books at least $150 in profit — a flat day, a losing day and a scratch day all count for nothing. The split is 90/10. Topstep also offers a Consistency payout path with its own rules; the path is chosen once per funded account and cannot be changed.
What most often ends a Topstep account
- Holding a loser because the line "only moves at the close". It moves at the close, but it is checked every second. This is the signature Topstep failure: an open position touches the limit at lunch on a day the trader expected to finish green.
- Holding a loser into the reset. An open position that is underwater is already counted. "I will let it work overnight" spends daily room in a session you are not watching.
- Sizing for the profit target instead of the floor. The target is the reward; the floor is the constraint. Traders who size off the target hit the floor first, in almost every failed account.
Tracking a Topstep account
The reason these rules are worth reading closely is that none of them are checked by your platform. Your broker shows you a balance; the firm is watching a floor, a daily limit and a share of profit that your balance alone does not tell you about. Edgekeeper loads this rule set onto an account and does the arithmetic on every trade you log: how much daily loss room is left right now, where the drawdown floor currently sits, how many qualifying days you have, and whether one big day has put the consistency rule between you and a payout.
It also warns you before you write the trade, not after. The point is not to be a scoreboard — it is to be the thing that says "this trade takes you inside the last third of your daily loss" while you can still decide something about it.
Prop firms revise their rules regularly, and they differ by plan size, by phase and sometimes by promotion. Everything above is the rule set Edgekeeper loads for Topstep, checked against the firm's own published rules on the date at the top of this page — but Topstep's own page is the authority, and every field is editable on your account, so if your plan differs you can change it and the app will judge you by your numbers rather than these.
Topstep rules: common questions
How does the Topstep trailing drawdown work?
On the rule set Edgekeeper loads, the floor trails your end-of-day balance — every new closing high pulls it up behind you and it never falls back. The floor stops rising once it reaches your starting balance, and everything you make above that is buffer you cannot lose back to the trail.
Does open profit and loss count at Topstep?
Yes. The floor only moves at the close, but both it and the daily loss limit are checked against live equity, so an open loser can breach either one before you have closed anything.
What is the Topstep consistency rule?
In the Trading Combine, no single day may account for more than 55% of your total profit. It is a ratio, so it clears as the rest of your profit grows — you never need to give a good day back. The Standard payout path on a funded account has no consistency target.
When does the Topstep trading day reset?
At 5:00 p.m. America/Chicago — around the futures session close rather than at local midnight, so an evening trade usually belongs to the next trading day.
How many trading days does Topstep require before a payout?
5 on this rule set. A day counts only if it books at least $150 in profit — a flat day, a losing day and a scratch day all count for nothing. The split is 90/10.
Track a Topstep account in Edgekeeper — free
These are the exact rules Edgekeeper loads. Create the account and every trade you log updates your daily loss room, your live drawdown floor, your qualifying days and your payout eligibility — and warns you before a trade takes you past a limit. One prop account is free, forever, no card.
Track a Topstep account freeOther prop firms
New to these limits? Start with daily loss vs. trailing max drawdown.