Three firms cover the overwhelming majority of funded futures flow in 2026: Topstep, Apex Trader Funding (4.0), and MyFundedFutures. They share the trailing-drawdown skeleton but diverge on the three axes that actually decide whether you survive activation — trail type (intraday vs EOD), where the trail locks, and whether a consistency rule applies on funded payouts. This page is the routing layer: pick the firm that fits your trader profile, then dive into the rule mechanics on its dedicated page.
Pick the page that matches what you actually want from a funded account, not the firm with the loudest discount code. The three firms are aimed at three different trader profiles — picking on price alone is the single most common reason traders blow accounts at the rule level, not the trade level.
Three pages, three rule mechanics. Each one covers plans + costs + the specific rule landmines that trip up traders on that firm.
25K / 50K / 100K / 150K eval sizes. Trail type chosen at purchase (EOD or intraday). No DLL on intraday-trail accounts; DLL on EOD-trail. 30% consistency on funded payouts. Lock at Starting Balance + $100, meaning $100 of permanent buffer after activation.
50K / 100K / 150K Combine sizes. Combine uses intraday trail; Express Funded (XFA) uses EOD trail. 50% consistency on the eval, no consistency on funded payouts. DLL still enforced on Combine; XFA via TopstepX removed default DLL in Aug 2024 (NT8 retained it).
Three archetypes: Core (50K, EOD trail, 40% consistency on BOTH eval + funded — stricter than most), Rapid (50K / 100K / 150K, intraday trail, no consistency), Pro (instant funding, no eval). $0 activation. 80–90% profit split. Payouts every 5 days post-activation.
5 eval sizes (25K / 50K / 75K / 100K / 150K). EOD trail in Test, intraday in PRO, EOD again in PRO+. 50% consistency on Test only — drops on funded. No DLL since Jan 2025. 80% split on PRO, 90% on PRO+ (auto-promoted since 2026-03-18). Daily payouts on funded once buffer cleared.
Three programs (Growth 1-step / Select 1-step / Lightning instant). EOD trail uniform across all programs. Lock at SB + $100 (same archetype as Apex / MFFU). $0 activation fee. 90/10 split after first $15K. 5-account / $1M cap. Tradesea / Tradovate / WealthCharts only — no NinjaTrader, no TradingView, no MetaTrader.
Six account sizes (10K / 25K / 50K / 100K / 150K / 250K). PERMANENT binary choice at signup: Option 1 (intraday HWM trail, no DLL, full contracts day one) or Option 2 (EOD trail, with DLL, contract scaling). Lock at SB + $100. 40% consistency on Master + Funded only — NOT Qualification. First $10K of payouts at 100%, then 90/10. NinjaTrader / Rithmic-first — no native Tradovate. Weekly Wednesday payouts. Subscription-based ($145–$535/mo by size).
Two products: Gauntlet Mini (GAU 50K / 100K / 150K / 200K, fixed-size) and Trader Career Path (TCP 25K / 50K / 100K, scales to $200K–$400K). EOD-only trail, lock at Starting Balance (Topstep family — NOT SB+$100). 30% consistency on eval only — explicitly dropped on funded. $139 activation deducted from FIRST WITHDRAWAL only, not paid upfront. 80/20 split, $100 min payout, weekly Wednesday cadence. NinjaTrader + Tradovate + R|Trader + TradingView + Finamark (widest platform support in cluster). 2025 pass rate: 8.89% (publicly disclosed).
Across all four firms, the same three axes determine whether your account survives activation. Every other rule (profit target, activation fee, payout cadence) matters for the path to funded but doesn't decide what kills the account afterward.
| Rule axis | Topstep | Apex 4.0 | MFFU | TPT | Tradeify | Bulenox | Earn2Trade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Trail type | Combine = intraday XFA funded = EOD |
Chosen at purchase: EOD or intraday | Core = EOD Rapid = intraday Pro = EOD |
Test = EOD PRO = intraday PRO+ = EOD |
EOD uniform across Growth / Select / Lightning |
Permanent choice at signup: Option 1 = intraday Option 2 = EOD |
EOD uniform across GAU + TCP |
| Lock point | Starting Balance ($0 buffer) | SB + $100 ($100 buffer) | SB + $100 ($100 buffer) | Starting Balance ($0 buffer) | SB + $100 ($100 buffer) | SB + $100 ($100 buffer) | Starting Balance ($0 buffer) |
| Consistency rule | 50% eval only None on funded |
30% on funded payouts | Core: 40% on eval AND funded Rapid: none Pro: TBD |
50% on Test only None on PRO / PRO+ |
Growth: none eval / 35% funded Select: 40% eval / none funded Lightning: 20→25→30% progressive |
40% on Master + Funded only None on Qualification |
30% on eval only None on funded (explicitly dropped) |
| Daily loss limit | Yes on Combine Conditional on XFA |
EOD accounts only None on intraday |
None on any plan | None — removed firmwide Jan 2025 | Growth eval only Lightning 50K+ only +6% bump rule on funded |
Option 1 = none Option 2 = yes (auto-flat, no breach) |
Yes — all account sizes ($550–$4,400 depending on size) |
All four tools run in your browser. No login, no card, no install. Use them with the rule presets above to stress-test which firm fits your style:
Topstep + Apex 4.0 presets. Models both intraday and EOD trail mechanics, lock thresholds, and your live headroom.
Open the calculator →Topstep 50%, Apex 30%, MFFU 40% presets. Drop in your daily P&L; see payout eligibility, extra profit needed, max-safe next-day.
Open the calculator →Topstep / Apex 4.0 / MFFU presets + 22 instruments. Computes N losses in a row to floor — the only sizing question that matters in a funded account.
Open the calculator →30+ contracts preloaded. Entry / exit / stop → ticks moved, gross + net P&L, $ risk, R-multiple. Cross-checks your firm statement.
Open the calculator →Seven firms in this cluster means 21 pairwise comparisons. The strongest structural divider is lock family — same-family pairs share the activation-day risk profile and differ on rule shape; cross-family pairs differ on the activation risk floor itself ($0 buffer vs $100 buffer on a 50K account). Pick the cell that matches the two firms you're actually choosing between.
Aurafy reads the CSV / statement from any of these firms, applies the correct rule preset per account (Topstep 100K Combine intraday, Apex 4.0 100K EOD, MFFU Rapid 50K, etc.), and shows live headroom on trail-DD, DLL, and consistency in one dashboard. Multiple accounts under one login, even across firms. Free tier never expires (last 30 days, 1 account, 3 playbooks, no card). First 50 founders: $19/mo locked for life.
Start free — no card See $19 founder seatThere is no objectively best firm — the three covered here target three different trader profiles. The honest framing: pick the firm whose rule-set penalty matches the failure mode you're least likely to fall into. Aggressive scalper who never holds intraday loss? Topstep XFA (EOD trail eliminates intraday spikes). Smaller account, swing-trader profile, comfortable with consistency math? Apex 4.0 with EOD trail. Want maximum intraday rope and don't mind a 40% consistency cap? MFFU Core or Rapid. Picking on monthly fee alone is the surest way to blow accounts you didn't need to take.
TopstepX is Topstep's proprietary trading platform, not a separate firm. Topstep launched it in 2024 as an alternative to NinjaTrader 8 / Tradovate. Same firm, same rules, but TopstepX removed the default daily loss limit in August 2024 — meaning the same Topstep account behaves differently on TopstepX vs NinjaTrader. The Topstep page covers this; the NinjaTrader broker page covers the platform-side DLL difference.
The Earn2Trade page is now live, covering both Gauntlet Mini (GAU 50K–200K, fixed-size) and Trader Career Path (TCP 25K–100K with built-in scaling to $200K–$400K), the EOD-only trail with lock at Starting Balance (Topstep family, not the SB+$100 family), the 30% consistency rule that's explicitly dropped on the funded account, and the three structural wedges no other firm in this cluster shares — activation deferred to the first withdrawal, consistency dies at the funded gate, and LiveSim as a permanent funded state where 94.77% of 2025 passers chose to stay on simulated capital rather than convert to Live. The firm cluster is now complete — Apex, Topstep, MFFU, TPT, Tradeify, Bulenox, and Earn2Trade all have dedicated rule-mechanics pages.
Yes — and most serious prop traders do. The standard pattern is 2–3 firms in eval simultaneously to maximize the odds one of them passes, then concentrate on the funded account(s) that activate. Aurafy treats each as a separate account under one journal login, so the trail-DD, DLL, and consistency math each applies correctly. The only constraint is firm-side: some firms cap how many simultaneous evals you can hold at THEIR firm (Apex allows up to 20; Topstep allows 1 active Combine).
Three different lock points, three different activation-day risk profiles. Topstep locks at Starting Balance — meaning $100,000 on a 100K funded account becomes the permanent floor once the trail reaches it. Apex 4.0 and MFFU both lock at SB + $100, meaning $100 of permanent buffer above starting balance (e.g. $103,100 on Apex 100K). The $100 doesn't sound like much, but in practice it covers most single-loss-on-activation-day scenarios. The trailing-drawdown calculator shows the math for any of the three.
No — and this is where most traders get burned. Topstep applies 50% consistency on the Combine eval only; no consistency rule on funded payouts. Apex 4.0 applies 30% consistency on funded payouts only (not eval). MFFU Core applies 40% consistency on BOTH eval AND funded (the strictest setup of the three). The consistency calculator lets you check eligibility under each firm's rule. The strategic implication is in the comparison hub: pick the firm whose consistency-application matches the phase you spend most of your time in.
Intraday-trail firms favor scalpers who close flat at session end — every realized gain ratchets the trail up immediately, but you also don't carry unrealized risk overnight. Apex 4.0 intraday accounts, Topstep Combines, and MFFU Rapid all work. EOD-trail firms (Topstep XFA, Apex EOD, MFFU Core) penalize giveback days less but punish ratchet days more (you keep more of the unrealized gain over the close, but if you book big in-session and give it back, only your closing P&L moves the trail). For a high-frequency scalper, intraday trail is usually the better fit.
Most prop firms don't allow overnight holds on funded futures accounts, or charge punitive holding fees. Topstep allows holding into Sunday evening for XFA only; Apex 4.0 forces flat by 4:59pm ET; MFFU varies by plan. If overnight holds are your edge, prop-firm futures is the wrong vehicle — look at retail margin futures or futures options instead. None of the three firms on this page are built for that style.
We don't take affiliate kickbacks from any prop firm. Aurafy makes money from a $49 / $19-founder subscription to the journal, not from sending you to one firm over another. That's why this page recommends picking by failure-mode-fit, not by discount code. The same independence framing carries through the competitor comparison posts — we make money from a tool, not from referrals.