Performance metrics
Win rate
The share of closed trades that finished in profit: winning trades ÷ total trades × 100. Win rate on its own says nothing about profitability — a 30% win rate is excellent if the winners are four times the size of the losers, and a 70% win rate loses money if the losers are five times the size of the winners. Always read it next to the payoff ratio. Free win rate calculator.
Profit factor
Gross profit divided by gross loss: total won ÷ total lost. Above 1.0 means the strategy made money over the sample; 1.5 and above is generally considered healthy, and anything above roughly 3.0 on a small sample usually means the sample is too small rather than the edge being extraordinary. Free profit factor calculator.
Expectancy
The average amount you expect to win or lose per trade: (win rate × average win) − (loss rate × average loss). Expressed in currency or in R. A positive expectancy is the minimum requirement for a strategy to be worth trading; position sizing then determines how fast that expectancy compounds.
R-multiple
A trade result expressed as a multiple of the risk taken on it. If you risked $100 and made $250, the trade is +2.5R; if you lost the full stop, it is −1R. R-multiples let you compare trades of different sizes and different instruments on one scale, which is why they are the standard unit for reporting a journal.
Payoff ratio
Average winning trade divided by average losing trade. Combined with win rate it determines expectancy. A payoff ratio below 1 is workable only with a high win rate.
Risk-reward ratio
The planned relationship between what a trade risks and what it targets, set before entry — a stop 20 pips away with a 60-pip target is 1:3. It is a plan, not a result: the realised R-multiple is what actually happened. Free risk/reward calculator.
Risk terms
Drawdown
The decline from an equity peak to the following trough, in currency or percent. Drawdown measures the pain a strategy puts you through, which is usually what ends an account rather than a lack of edge.
Maximum drawdown
The largest peak-to-trough decline over the whole period being measured. A strategy with a 40% maximum drawdown needs a 67% gain to get back to the previous peak — recovery is not symmetric with the loss.
Trailing drawdown
A drawdown limit that moves up with your account high-water mark instead of staying fixed at the starting balance. Common in prop-firm evaluations: if the limit is $2,000 trailing and the account rises from $50,000 to $52,000, the floor rises from $48,000 to $50,000 with it. Some firms trail on closed balance only, others on unrealised equity — the difference decides whether an open winner can move your floor against you.
Risk per trade
The amount of account equity put at risk on a single position, usually expressed as a percentage. The distance between entry and stop, plus the position size, sets it.
Risk of ruin
The probability that a sequence of losses takes the account below the point where it can keep trading. It rises steeply with risk per trade: the same edge that survives comfortably at 1% risk can be wiped out at 5%.
Position size
How many lots, contracts or units to trade so that the distance to your stop equals your intended risk. It is the one variable that turns a risk rule into an actual order. Free position size calculator.
Execution terms
MAE — maximum adverse excursion
The furthest a trade moved against you before it closed. Comparing MAE across winners tells you whether your stops are wider than they need to be.
MFE — maximum favourable excursion
The furthest a trade moved in your favour before it closed. A large gap between MFE and the actual result on winners is the signature of exiting too early.
Slippage
The difference between the price you expected and the price you got. Normal in fast markets and around news; consistently large slippage in quiet conditions points at the broker or the order type.
Spread
The gap between bid and ask — the cost of entering and exiting. It widens around news releases, at the daily rollover, and in thin sessions.
Swap (rollover)
The interest credited or debited for holding a leveraged position overnight, set by the rate differential between the two currencies. Swap turns an otherwise break-even long-held trade into a loser more often than most journals reveal.
Journaling terms
Trading journal
A record of every trade with the context around it — the reason for entry, how it was managed, the state you were in, and what the result was. Its value comes from the context: a list of P&L figures is a statement, not a journal.
Setup tag
A label for the pattern or trigger that caused the entry — liquidity sweep, order block, range breakout. Tagging consistently is what lets you compare one setup against another later.
Trading session
The market hours a trade belongs to — Sydney, Tokyo, London or New York. Most strategies perform very differently by session, and a journal that records it will usually show a session edge the trader did not know they had.
Equity curve
Account balance plotted over time. Its shape carries information a summary number cannot: a straight climb, a long flat stretch, or a single spike that carries the whole result.
P&L calendar
Daily profit and loss laid out as a month grid. It surfaces day-of-week and time-of-month patterns, and makes losing streaks visible as a block rather than as rows in a table.
Which of these Edgelog reports for you
Edgelog computes win rate, profit factor, R-multiples, the equity curve, drawdown and the daily P&L calendar automatically from synced or imported trades, and lets you tag setups and record notes, screenshots and mood per trade. It is free — unlimited trades, no credit card, no trial clock. Metrics not in that list are defined here because you will meet them elsewhere, not because the app reports them.