Trade copier software: where it runs decides what it costs you
Trade copier software has to run somewhere, and where it runs decides much of what it costs you: on your own machine, inside one trading platform, on a provider's servers, or a mix of these. Each of the three costs you something — a machine left on, a single platform, or trust in whoever runs the servers. Tradeus is the third, with one exception, and this page says what that costs as well.
A desktop bridge: your machine, your credentials, your uptime
A desktop bridge is a program on a computer you own. What it buys is that your broker credentials can stay on that machine. What it costs is the machine: if it sleeps, restarts for an update or loses its connection, copying stops. If it receives TradingView alerts itself, it also has to clear TradingView's own limits on your home connection, at any hour: answer within three seconds, on port 80 or 443, and without IPv6. Keeping all of that up is your job, not the software's.
A copier inside one platform: the platform is the boundary
A copier that lives inside one trading platform reaches the accounts on that platform. The boundary is the platform itself: an account your firm issues on a different platform sits outside it. If that copier lives in a desktop application, it runs only while the application is open, which is the bridge's cost again. Where each compared product runs is set out on the comparison pages, where every row about another product carries a source on that product's own site.
A hosted service: nothing of yours awake, and a way in you grant
A hosted copier runs on the provider's machines. The alert goes from TradingView to its server and from there to your broker, none of that path is your computer, and a closed laptop changes nothing. The cost is trust. You give the service a way into accounts with money in them, and it acts on what it is told: here, a misconfigured alert fires as fast as a correct one. Hosting does not remove distance either. The order still crosses the public internet from the server to the broker, and a broker on another continent costs over a hundred milliseconds before anyone has done any work. Tradeus logs that latency on each fill, its own time apart from the broker's wherever the broker reports it.
Where Tradeus sits
Tradeus is hosted, apart from MetaTrader 5. Tradovate connects by OAuth, so you log in at Tradovate and Tradeus never sees the password. Rithmic and TradeLocker take a login; Capital.com and Alpaca take an API key you create yourself. Whatever you enter is encrypted with AES-256-GCM before it is written to disk and deleted when you remove the connection. MetaTrader 5 takes the bridge's trade-off on purpose: a small program runs in your own terminal and asks Tradeus what to do, so no password is collected, and when the terminal closes, copying stops. The copier itself is one leader and any number of followers, each sized for itself, across brokers and prop firms, as long as leader and followers trade the same market.
What Tradeus does not do
It does not reach NinjaTrader, and cTrader and TopstepX are listed but cannot be connected yet. Alpaca is US shares and crypto with no futures, and a futures account cannot follow a CFD leader. A daily loss limit you set is not weighed against each order in advance: each armed account is re-read about every five seconds and locked once a limit is crossed, so a fast market can carry the loss past it. Whether a trade you place by hand on the leader is copied depends on the leader's broker: the copier docs linked below cover it, and the readiness panel says it for your group before you trade. And nothing here checks your firm's rules.
What it costs, and who decides whether you may
No plan counts accounts. Broker connections, source accounts, target accounts and copy groups are unlimited on all three plans, so one funded account or fifteen costs the same; what the plans separate is automation, meaning the TradingView webhook and how many strategies you run. The cheapest plan, Manual, is the complete copier without the webhook, risk-dollar sizing or AI, so what it copies is the trade you place by hand on the leader. Current prices are on the pricing page, because they are set at the checkout rather than typed into pages like this one. Whether your firm permits a copier, automation or a hosted service is the firm's decision, it can differ per account, and the only place to find it is your own account's terms.
The facts, in one place
- Where Tradeus runs
- On its own servers; for MetaTrader 5, a small program in your own terminal asks it what to do
- Connectable today
- Tradovate, Rithmic, TradeLocker, Capital.com, MetaTrader 5, Alpaca (no futures)
- Listed but not connectable
- cTrader, TopstepX
- Accounts counted on any plan
- None — connections, accounts and copy groups are unlimited
- Daily loss limit
- If you set one: re-read about every 5 seconds; acts once it is crossed
- What TradingView asks of a receiver
- An answer within 3 seconds, on port 80 or 443, no IPv6
- What we state about your firm's rules
- Nothing — read your own account's terms
Checked against the product on 15 October 2026. If something here no longer matches what you see, tell us.
Questions people ask first
Do I need to leave my computer on?
Not for Tradovate, Rithmic, TradeLocker or Capital.com: the endpoint, the copier and the account lock run on Tradeus's servers, and none of the path from TradingView to your broker is your machine. MetaTrader 5 is the exception. There a small program runs inside your own terminal, so copying stops when the terminal closes or the computer sleeps, and nothing warns you, because a program that has stopped cannot report that it stopped.
Can one copier reach accounts at different prop firms and brokers?
Yes, as long as the leader and the followers trade the same market: futures accounts copy futures accounts, CFD accounts copy CFD accounts. A group is one leader and any number of followers, and neither groups nor followers are counted on any plan. Each follower carries its own size. On Algo and Unlimited that can be a dollar risk per trade, worked back from the stop distance; an alert carries one and a trade placed by hand does not, so a hand trade is copied one for one unless you set a minimum stop distance. On Manual, or with no risk set, the follower copies the leader's size one for one, capped by a max contracts figure if you set one.
Does my prop firm allow a trade copier?
That is your firm's answer to give, not ours, and it can differ between accounts at the same firm. We do not publish a list of what each firm permits, because we cannot keep one true, and a stale list is worse than none. Read your own account's terms on copy trading, automation and third-party services before you connect it. Nothing here checks those rules for you.
Does the daily loss limit stop an order that would breach it?
No. The limit is not weighed against each order in advance. A watchdog re-reads each armed account about every five seconds, and right after each order placed from an alert, then locks the account once the limit has been crossed and closes what is open where the broker lets it. So the order that crosses the line has already gone through, and a fast market can carry the loss past the figure. Set the limit with that room in mind.
Why would anyone choose a desktop bridge instead?
If you would rather no service held a way into your broker account, a program on your own machine can keep the credentials there, and that is a real advantage. The price is the machine and its connection, which have to stay up whenever you trade. Tradeus takes that trade-off only for MetaTrader 5, where the credentials stay in your terminal and the terminal has to stay open. If your accounts sit on a platform Tradeus does not connect, the comparison pages are the place to look, with every row about another product sourced to that product's own site.
Pick the shape that fits, then run it for a week.
Connect one account, point one decision at it, and see whether the part you are worried about holds before you trust it with more.