Apex Trader Funding Review (2026): Is It Worth It?

If you’ve spent any time researching prop firms, you’ve almost certainly come across Apex Trader Funding. It’s one of the most talked‑about names in futures trading, and for good reason. But popularity doesn’t always equal quality.

So the real question traders will be asking in 2026 is simple: Is Apex Trader Funding actually worth it, or is it just hype?

This review is written from a trader’s perspective. No fluff. No exaggerated promises. Just a clear breakdown of how Apex works, who it’s best for, where traders struggle, and whether it makes sense for you.

What Is Apex Trader Funding?

Apex Trader Funding is a futures prop firm that allows traders to trade firm capital after passing an evaluation. Instead of risking your own large account, you trade under Apex’s rules and keep a percentage of the profits.

Unlike some prop firms that focus on stocks or forex, Apex is futures‑only, which appeals to traders focused on instruments like the ES, NQ, YM, and other CME products.

The appeal is obvious:

• No need to fund a large personal account

• Defined rules and risk limits

• Scalable capital if you perform well

But the structure matters, and that’s where many traders either succeed or fail.

How the Apex Evaluation Works (High‑Level)

To get funded, you must first pass an evaluation account. The evaluation is designed to prove consistency and risk control rather than one lucky trade.

While specific numbers vary by account size, the core structure stays the same:

• A profit target you must reach

• A trailing drawdown that follows your account

• Rules around consistency and discipline

This trailing drawdown is the biggest hurdle for most traders. It rewards slow, controlled growth and punishes oversized trades.

Many traders fail not because they can’t trade, but because they misunderstand how the drawdown moves.

What Happens After You Pass?

Once you pass the evaluation, you’re eligible for a funded account. This is where Apex starts to shine for disciplined traders.

With a funded account:

• You trade real firm capital

• You’re eligible for payouts

• You keep a large portion of profits

Payout eligibility depends on following Apex’s rules and maintaining account health. This isn’t a “get rich quick” setup, but it is a real opportunity for traders who already have an edge.

What Traders Like About Apex Trader Funding

Apex has earned loyalty from many traders, and these are the reasons that come up repeatedly.

1. Futures‑Focused Environment

If you trade futures, Apex feels built for you. The rules, platforms, and structure are clearly designed around futures markets.

2. Scalable Capital

Traders who perform well can scale up over time. This is one of the biggest psychological advantages. You don’t feel capped at a small account forever.

3. Clear, Transparent Rules

While strict, the rules are clearly laid out. There’s no ambiguity about what will disqualify an account.

4. Popularity and Community

Because Apex is so widely used, there’s a large online community discussing strategies, pitfalls, and best practices. That alone reduces the learning curve.

5. Massive Discounts

Apex offers the highest discounts among prop firms, ranging from 80 - 90% off evaluations any given time. You can enter my discount code, BOB, during checkout to get the best discount available that they’re offering.

Where Traders Struggle (And Why Some Quit)

A fair review needs to cover the downsides too.

Trailing Drawdown Pressure

This is the number one complaint. The trailing drawdown forces traders to size down and trade patiently. Aggressive styles almost always fail.

Psychological Difficulty

Knowing one bad trade can violate rules creates pressure. Traders without strict risk management often self‑sabotage.

Not Beginner‑Friendly

If you’re brand new to futures, Apex may feel overwhelming. It’s best suited for traders who already understand order flow, position sizing, and discipline.

Who Apex Trader Funding Is Best For

Apex tends to work best for traders who:

• Already have a proven strategy

• Understand futures markets

• Are comfortable trading small and scaling slowly

• Can follow rules without emotional decisions

If you’re still experimenting or gambling, Apex will likely expose those weaknesses quickly.

Is Apex Trader Funding Legit?

This question comes up a lot, and it’s understandable.

Apex Trader Funding is a legitimate prop firm with real traders receiving payouts. That said, legitimacy doesn’t mean guaranteed success. You still need skill and discipline.

Think of Apex as a tool. In the right hands, it can be powerful. In the wrong hands, it’s unforgiving.

Final Verdict: Is Apex Trader Funding Worth It in 2026?

If you’re a disciplined futures trader who respects risk and consistency, Apex Trader Funding can absolutely be worth it.

If you’re hoping for fast money, oversized trades, or rule‑bending, it probably isn’t.

For traders who are ready to treat trading like a business, Apex offers one of the more realistic paths to trading meaningful capital.

Apex Trader Funding: Full Review 2024

In a world of competitive prop firms that have attracted the attention of many interested traders, Apex Trader Funding stands out prolifically based on its popularity and brand. When you think of the term, prop firm, Apex Trader Funding undoubtedly comes to mind first.

But why is that? What makes it significantly more popular than the rest? We will answer that question by providing a deep dive on everything Apex from the straightforward rules to the easily affordable evaluation plans.

For a limited time, SAVE 80% and only a ONE day pass with promo code BOB

WHAT IS APEX TRADER FUNDING?

Apex Trader Funding (ATF) is one of the leading proprietary trading firms in the futures market. A proprietary trading firm, or simply prop firm, is when a company provides capital to a trader so that they don't have to risk their own.

Most prop firms require traders to pass an assessment in order to prove they have the necessary skills to manage their capital. In return, the trader isn’t risking anything other than the fees associated with the assessment process and the prop firm potentially has a skilled trader trading on their behalf.

Apex Trader Funding simplifies the entire assessment process by making it a one-step evaluation. Once you pass this one-step evaluation, traders are given a funded account to day trade futures contracts and earn money based on their risk tolerance. That risk tolerance will be dependent on the type of account size they choose during the evaluation stage and we’ll talk about that further.

Rithmic Plans

TRADOVATE Plans

As seen above, Apex can be broken down into two sets of plans: a Rithmic plan or a Tradovate plan. Each plan offers multiple evaluations, ranging from $25k - $300k accounts. There is also a $100k static account which we’ll get to later.

Both Rithmic and Tradovate are trading platform providers. But the biggest difference between the two is Tradovate is slightly more expensive than Rithmic. Although this can lean more traders towards a Rithmic plan, Tradovate is the only platform compatible with Mac that Apex offers. In addition to Rithmic and Tradovate, Apex Trader Funding also offers the ability to trade on Ninjatrader (part of the Rithmic plan) - which again, like Rithmic, is only exclusive to Windows.

Each evaluation account, regardless if it’s from Rithmic or Tradovate, has the same objective and set of rules: meet your profit goal and do not hit the trailing threshold.

As you can see from the images above, depending on the account size you choose, each evaluation has different profit goals and a different trailing threshold amount. However, once you meet the profit goal in any of the accounts while not hitting its trailing threshold, traders will pass Apex’s evaluation and are ready to be funded.

As far as the $100k static account, there is no trailing threshold like the others. You only need to be aware of the total drawdown, which in this case, is $625. So what that means is the account balance can not go below $99,375 ($100k - $625). However, unlike the trailing threshold, the static account will not continue to trail your profits. The drawdown threshold will remain at $99,375 no matter how much you make (realized or unrealized) whereas with the other accounts, your profits will be trailed.

For example, the trailing threshold for the $50k full account is $2,500 which puts the threshold at $47,500 - meaning your balance cannot go below that amount. But let’s say you make $1,000 profit and your starting balance increases to $51,000. Then your drawdown balance also goes up $1,000 from $47,500 to $48,500. With the static account, you don’t have to worry about this.

WHAT IS A TRAILING THRESHOLD
- A DEEPER DIVE

If you’re going to learn anything about the Apex prop firm rules, learn this. That’s because the trailing threshold will be the definitive factor on whether you fail or keep an account.

As stated previously, the trailing threshold will continue to trail the profits you make both in the evaluation and funded accounts. So using the example I mentioned before, say you have a $50k account. You make $1,000 and increase the starting balance to $51,000. Again, the trailing threshold balance also goes up by $1,000 from $47,500 to $48,500.

HOWEVER, let’s change things up a bit. Say you’re making $1,000 profit. But instead, you decide not to sell because you think it’s going to go higher. This intuition backfires and the trade goes against you. So instead of making more, you lose your $1,000 and decide to sell breakeven, bringing your total balance back to $50,000. Even though you didn’t lock in any profits, your trailing threshold still went up by $1,000, bringing the balance from $47,500 to $48,500. So now you’re left with only a $1,500 trailing threshold instead of the initial $2,500.

This is because the trailing threshold continues to trial your profits, REGARDLESS if you sell your position or not. The trailing threshold takes into account both realized and UNREALIZED gains. This is a very key detail that gets overlooked and why many traders fail their accounts.

But the good news is once the trailing threshold reaches the initial starting balance ($50k in this case), it will no longer follow your profits. It will stay at $50k. So if you increased your account balance from $50k to $60k, that’ll now give you a $10k cushion of your trailing threshold. But if you somehow manage to lose all those gains and your account balance touches or goes below $50k, you will lose your funded account.

Image Credit: OneUp Trader (Another prop firm with an unrealized trailing threshold)
$100k account example of how the trailing threshold (or drawdown as OneUp calls it) trails your profits until it reaches your starting balance.

THE RULES

Like every prop firm, you have to follow the rules and regulations they provide in order to continue trading with them. The following table breaks down the differences and similarities between the evaluation rules and the funded account rules.

EVALUATION RULES	FUNDED ACCOUNT RULES
Meet profit goal	Meet profit threshold
Don't hit trailing threshold	Don't hit trailing threshold
Trade a minimum of 7 days (unless there's a promotion)	Trade a minimum of 10 days (in order to be payout-eligible)
Trading news allowed	Don't trade the news
No consistency rule	Meet consistency rule

As indicated in the table above, the evaluation rules state you have to meet the profit goal which will be dependent on the account size you choose.

Do not hit the trailing threshold we talked about earlier or you’ll fail the evaluation.

You have to trade a minimum of 7 days unless there’s a 1-day pass promotion going on and there usually is. But if not, you’re allowed to meet your profit goal early and then spend the rest of the trading days quickly scalping a micro contract in order to fulfill the requirement.

Unlike a funded account, trading the news is allowed.

And there are no consistency rules you need to follow.

For the funded account, you have to meet the profit threshold which is the minimum balance needed for your account in order to be eligible for a payout. But just because you can withdraw at the minimum doesn’t mean you should. Remember, once you withdraw past the minimum, it’ll eat into your initial trailing threshold. So it’s best to build on a cushion above the minimum before any withdrawal is considered.

Like the evaluation, do not hit the trailing threshold.

Again, regarding the payout rules which we’ll get into shortly, you have to trade a minimum of 10 days.

You cannot trade the news. Apex doesn’t want traders to trade off luck where the futures market is the most volatile during news events that could make or break an account.

And you have to meet the consistency rule which states a single trading day cannot be greater than 30% of your total profits. In addition, you cannot dollar cost-average a negative PnL while trading except one time only.

PAYOUT RULES
Two payout periods per month
Can only withdraw a certain amount depending on account size (for first 3 months only)
Minimum withdrawal is $500
Traders keep 100% of first $25k per account
Profit split 90/10

You’re only allowed two payout periods per month. For each payout period, you’re not allowed to withdraw above a certain amount. These restrictions only apply the first 3 months. After that, you can withdraw as much profits as you’d like. The following is the max allowed amount for each account size for a payout period before those 3 months:

$25k Account- $1,500

$50k Account- $2,000

$75k Account- $2,250

$100k Account- $2,500

$150k Account- $2,750

$250k Account- $3,000

$300k Account- $3,500

$100k Static Account- $1,000

The minimum withdrawal amount is $500 - meaning you’re not allowed to withdraw any less than that.

The profit split between the trader and Apex is 90/10. Traders get to keep 90% and Apex keeps 10%. But traders get to keep 100% of the first $25k and that’s PER account.

So hypothetically, if you pass five $50k evaluations and use a trade copier to copy your trades for each of these accounts, the first $125,000 totaling all accounts would be yours. This is one of the magnificent benefits of Apex Trader Funding. But let’s talk more about the company’s overall pros and cons.

PROS & CONS

PROS

• Simplified one-step evaluation that requires you to hit the profit goal and avoid the trailing threshold - nothing more

• Allows you to select up to an industry high of 8 different account size plans ranging from $25k to $300k

• Offers the highest discounts for evaluations among all prop firms

• Profit split is among the industry’s highest (90/10) as well as allowing traders to keep 100% of the first $25k per account

• No daily drawdowns unlike other prop firms

• Could trade up to 20 funded accounts at the same time using a trade copier - easily the highest among other prop firms

CONS

• Trailing threshold is unrealized whereas some other prop firms offer a more favorable drawdown like end of day which doesn’t calculate any of your gains until the trading day is complete and you’ve sold your position

• Restricted to day trades only whereas a few other prop firms allow you to swing trade

• No telephone number or live chat for customer support (submission ticket only through message board)

• Activation fees for funded account per account

WHY CHOOSE APEX?

As detailed above, the pros far outweigh the cons for Apex Trader Funding. But every prop firm has their pros. What makes Apex that much more popular? I think most traders would agree it’s their prices.

The average price to usually sign up for an evaluation for most prop firms is 3-figures. Apex Trader Funding falls within this range too as indicated by the monthly prices in the Rithmic and Tradovate plans. But Apex has promotions going on ALL the time from half-off evaluations to 90% off!

In fact, they’re promoting 80 - 90% off almost constantly throughout the year. So with 90% off, you’d pay no more than $16.70 or $18.70 for a $50k Rithmic or Tradovate plan, respectively. As someone who has vast experience in the prop trading community, you’re almost never going to find a bargain like that.

Although these promotions sound enticing, Apex does have an activation fee you have to consider. Once you pass their evaluation, you have to pay an activation fee to activate your funded account. And this is PER account.

They provide a monthly option of $85 or a lifetime option in which you only have to pay one time. The following are the lifetime activation amounts for each account:

Rithmic Plans:

25k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee          $130        

50k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee          $140

75k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee          $180

100k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee

(full and static account)                                   $220

150k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee        $260

250k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee        $300

300k PA Activation Account Lifetime Fee        $340

Tradovate Plans:

25k PA Tradovate Activation Account Lifetime Fee $150

50k PA Tradovate Activation Account Lifetime Fee $160

75k PA Tradovate Activation Account Lifetime Fee $200

100k PA Tradovate Activation Account Lifetime Fee $240

150k PA Tradovate Activation Account Lifetime Fee $280

250k PA Tradovate Activation Account Lifetime Fee $320

300k PA Tradovate Activation Account Lifetime Fee $360

Most traders opt to pay for the lifetime fee instead of the monthly fee since they would save a signifcant amount in the long run. However, there are traders that choose to pay the $85 per month because it can be difficult to hold a funded account for a long period. A lot of traders ultimately end up failing it because they went below their trailing threshold and are already looking for the next promotion to repurchase another evaluation. And for them, a monthly option may save them more than the lifetime option.

You’re probably thinking even though I’m saving a lot of money using the promotions Apex offers on their evaluations, I ultimately end up paying the same as the industry average if you take into account the activation fees you have to pay afterwards. So how does this justify Apex’s popularity?

The key difference is while most prop firms require 3-figure payments up front when purchasing an evaluation, Apex only requires it afterwards. If you’re going to invest around three figures, wouldn’t you want to make sure you pass the evaluation first?

So the unique thing about Apex is, with their promotion, you’re essentially paying significantly less to take the evaluation to see if you pass or not before you end up paying majority of the overall fees. If you fail their evaluation, you only lose a modest amount of your money because of their discounted prices compared to failing the evaluations for most other prop firms.

IS APEX TRADER FUNDING LEGIT AND TRUSTWORTHY?

Yes. As someone who has gotten payouts from them, himself, Apex Trader Funding is as professional as they come. Here are the average ratings of the firm as provided by Trustpilot:

These reviews are from over 7,000 verified users that have used Apex’s services and majority of them provided a 5-star rating. Additionally, Apex’s website has various questions answered in thorough detail that one may have before signing up for a service in their FAQ section.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Apex Trader Funding continues to be in the forefront of the prop trading business with their simplistic one-step evaluation and unmatched promotional evaluation plans. With their clear rules and objective, Apex Trader Funding makes it easier for the trader to earn a funded account.

Rather than risking their own capital which would be a lot based on the initial margin required by most brokers to trade futures, Apex allows the opportunity and flexibility for traders to trade futures risk-free.

For more helpful resources on Apex Trader Funding, please check out the video below on everything Apex from how to pass to all the rules and regulations that need to be followed in a very visual-friendly manner.