Plain-English guide to Topstep in 2026: how the Combine differs from the Express Funded Account, exactly how the trailing drawdown moves, when it locks at Starting Balance, and how the 50% consistency rule decides your payout. With free calculators.
Topstep has two stages and they use different trail mechanics. This is the single biggest source of confusion for new Topstep traders:
Deep dive → Topstep vs Tradeify 2026: phase-shift trail vs archetype-inverse consistency — Topstep ships one product across two phases with a firm-imposed intraday→EOD trail shift; Tradeify ships three products across one phase (Growth / Select / Lightning) you pick at signup, each with a uniform EOD trail. Same EOD-trail destination, opposite governance of how you get there.
The three Topstep account sizes and the core numbers that apply to both Combine and XFA:
| Account | Starting Balance | Profit Target (Combine) | Trailing Drawdown | Daily Loss Limit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 50K | $50,000 | $3,000 | $2,000 | $1,000 |
| 100K | $100,000 | $6,000 | $3,000 | $2,000 |
| 150K | $150,000 | $9,000 | $4,500 | $3,000 |
The Topstep lock formula: Lock Point = Starting Balance (exactly). There is no $100 safety-net buffer — when your EOD balance hits your original starting balance, the trail freezes there.
The trail is a moving floor under your balance. It starts at Starting Balance − Trailing Drawdown and follows your high-water mark (HWM) upward, but never moves down. Hit it and the account is breached.
Your HWM updates tick-by-tick on unrealized P&L. If you let a winner run +$1,500 on a 100K Combine then it pulls back to +$200, your trail still moved up by $1,500 — so you're now $1,500 closer to the lock point but you only realized $200. This is the classic Combine trap.
The HWM is calculated once at session close based on your closing balance. Intraday spikes don't move the trail. You still can't go below the current trail mid-session — it's enforced in real time — but the trail itself only updates daily, at close.
Deep dive → Topstep vs MyFundedFutures 2026: the EOD-trail head-to-head — what XFA's EOD trail looks like next to MFFU's EOD trail, where MFFU is more forgiving, where Topstep's $100k lock wins, with worked give-back examples on both.
Once your XFA closing balance reaches your original Starting Balance, the trail stops moving. Permanently. From that point you have a fixed floor at Starting Balance − Trailing Drawdown — your full drawdown is restored as a static buffer.
On a 100K Topstep XFA that's:
Important: the lock check is on the EOD balance, not on an intraday HWM. Spiking to $101k mid-day and giving it back at close does not lock the trail.
Topstep funded accounts use a 50% consistency rule on payouts: no single day's net profit can be more than 50% of your total profit on the payout. If your "best day" exceeds 50% of the total, your payout is capped at 2× your best day until you trade enough more days to balance it out.
Quick formula: to safely add a big winning day without breaking the rule, the maximum profit you can take on a single day is:
Max day P&L = 50% × Total Profit ÷ (1 − 50%) or equivalently 1.00 × current Total
So on a $4,000 cumulative payable profit, the safe ceiling for a single new day is roughly $4,000 — Topstep's 50% rule is the most lenient of the major firms (Apex is 30%, MFFU is 40%).
Deep dive → Earn2Trade vs Topstep 2026: the consistency-rule fork — Earn2Trade enforces a tighter 30% rule but it dies at the funded gate; Topstep's 50% rule is looser but persists into every payout. A structural contrast on when the rule actually bites.
No login, no email — just punch in your numbers:
See where your drawdown line is right now, headroom remaining, and how far you are from the lock — for Combine (intraday) and XFA (EOD) trail mechanics.
Open calculator →Platform-forked at Topstep: NinjaTrader users have a DLL ($1K / $2K / $3K by size); TopstepX killed it in August 2024. Get a cushion-remaining answer for NinjaTrader or a clear no-DLL notice for TopstepX so you don't trade against a rule you don't have.
Open calculator →Check your 50% Topstep consistency ratio in seconds. Tells you the largest day P&L allowed and extra profit needed to safely cash a big day.
Open calculator →Topstep Combine + XFA presets built in (SB lock floor + DLL). Punch in your stop in ticks and risk per trade — get max contracts, % of account, and how many losses in a row blow the account.
Open calculator →30+ futures contracts preloaded. Entry / exit / stop → ticks moved, gross + net P&L, $ risk, R-multiple. Cross-check your Topstep statement after the trade.
Open calculator →Aurafy is a futures trading journal built for prop-firm traders. It auto-tracks your trailing drawdown, lock distance, and consistency ratio in real time on Topstep and other major firms — plus screen-records your sessions so you can replay your mistakes.
Free tier: last 30 days of trades, 1 account, 3 playbooks, no credit card. First 50 founders lock in $19/mo for life.
See Aurafy Start freeThe Combine is Topstep's evaluation — you trade simulated capital and hit a profit target to qualify. The Express Funded Account (XFA) is the funded stage you graduate to. Trail type changes: Combine is intraday, XFA is end-of-day. Same loss limits and DLLs apply at each stage.
Yes. The daily loss limit (DLL) is a hard intraday floor, separate from the trail. On a 100K it's $2,000. It resets each session — touch it once and the day is over (the account isn't necessarily breached, but the day's done).
The trail only moves when your balance or HWM moves. Flat = trail stays where it is. Combine: unrealized P&L on an open position counts as HWM movement. XFA: only closing balance counts.
The trailing drawdown stops following your HWM and becomes a fixed floor at Starting Balance − Trailing Drawdown. Your full original drawdown is restored as a static buffer for the rest of the account's life.
Apex 4.0 locks at Starting Balance + $100 (a small buffer); Topstep locks at Starting Balance exactly. Apex lets you choose intraday or EOD trail at purchase; Topstep is intraday in the Combine and EOD in the XFA — no choice. Apex consistency rule is 30%; Topstep is 50% (more lenient).
Compared to TPT: same SB-exact lock family with no $100 buffer, but TPT's trail mechanic shifts by phase (Test EOD → PRO intraday → PRO+ EOD) while Topstep stays Combine intraday → XFA EOD with no second flip. Compared to Tradeify: opposite lock family (Tradeify is SB+$100), and Tradeify drops the DLL on Growth and Select while Topstep enforces a hard DLL on every account at every phase. Compared to Bulenox: opposite lock family + Bulenox forces a permanent Option 1 vs Option 2 trail-choice lock at signup that Topstep doesn't have — Topstep's intraday/EOD switch is automatic at the Combine→XFA transition. Compared to Earn2Trade: same SB-exact lock family, but Earn2Trade has the LiveSim two-state funded model and defers the $139 activation fee to first withdrawal — Topstep collects funded-account fees upfront and routes you to live data faster.
Compare side-by-side → All 21 prop-firm head-to-heads in one matrix — Topstep sits in the SB-exact lock family with TPT and Earn2Trade; the matrix groups every pairing by lock family so you can see which decisions are calibration vs which are bigger structural picks.