Should you use demo account?

Trading on demo account will give you same basics about forex tradig, but it’s not going to teach you anything about dealing with the emotions you will feel once that account balance is connected to your wallet

That’s true, but at least it gives you a pretty good feel of the market and allows you to practice your new skills without dealing with monetary loss and the negative emotions just yet.

And neither will a small account help you learn how to deal with your emotions. How many newbies lost 600 in 2005 and still whine about losing ever since.

if its about emotions, im not sure how well demo would do, but as long as you treat that demo money as real then it should be good. I guess all of us should go through demo, I trade demo even if I have a live acount for a couple of years now! it helps me clear some doubts in my head and try out some new strategy that i wont dare make on live hahah :

In demo you can also try using different deposits, lots, leverages getting detailed look of constitution of trading…

Demoing should definitely be used.

It allows you to test out whether your strategy is actually profitable before trading on the live markets with your money.

Very good points made right here. While demo doesn’t completely simulate the emotions involved, it’s still a better start compared to a newbie trader just jumping the gun and trading real money right away.

When it comes to this it really depends on the individual. The majority favors using demo accounts, the small minority is against it. In the end everyone needs to decide what they think is right. Personally I am against demo accounts and always advised new traders against it if they asked me about my view on them. Using a mini-account makes more sense and it actually teaches you how to trade, but besides that those who are terrified of facing losses should not trade to begin with.

I agree that using a demo account has its limitations, I have practiced for years on a demo and took crazy risks that I would never take on my live account… trade with pennies first to get yourself used to taking a real loss!

[QUOTE=“TheLastBear;633448”]When it comes to this it really depends on the individual. The majority favors using demo accounts, the small minority is against it. In the end everyone needs to decide what they think is right. Personally I am against demo accounts and always advised new traders against it if they asked me about my view on them. Using a mini-account makes more sense and it actually teaches you how to trade, but besides that those who are terrified of facing losses should not trade to begin with.[/QUOTE]

Totally agree with what lastbear says personally I’ve found that going live earlier in my trading was the best decision I’ve ever made even though it’s small and I trade nano lots I found it a lot useful than just demoing. I’m learning so much more than I ever could have with demo.

Ha Ha mate so true.

Ok, don’t go harsh on this as this is going to be my first post ever and I’m just charing my 2 cents.

I believe it all boils down to common sense. If I’m a new driver just learning to drive (not even knowing what a 1st gear means), would I learn it while i’m in a busy street or even a highway? If all that would be affected with my action is myself, then I’ll take full responsibility. However, driving means I have to deal with other drivers, pedestrians, police, street cars and etc. I think before I try to dive in, I would definitly need practice in a parking lot. By the way, that doesn’t mean if you play “Need for Speed” means you can also drive because those are totally different situations.

Sticking with your example of driving a car. I agree that you should take your first few rounds in a parking lot, but even in a parking lot you are driving in the real world. Trading in a mini-account or smaller where you only trade 0.01 lots can be compared to a parking lot. Trading demo is like playing ‘Need for Speed’ which you said would not help you learn how to drive. The same applies to demo. In NfS when you crash your car you get a new one and you feel no impact at all. Let’s say you drive in a big parking lot in the mall and for whatever reason you crash your car in the wall you will feel an impact. I hope you get my point.

Demo is good for as long as it takes to learn the trading plateform. After that you’ll do yourself more harm than good sticking with it. I have used comparison before, but your golf game won’t get better if you spend your time playing WGT online. Same with forex. No demo account will prepare you for the reality of trading.

Take last night 15 minutes before New York open. I was scalping the EURUSD when the market went nuts. Next thing my account was 20% up in pure profit but when I went to close the trade my server lock me out. aaargh! By the time I got back on I had lost half of that. I wasted a year playing in a demo account and nothing I experienced there prepared me for that!

I think it’s very personal. Learning the trading requires you to be absolutely focused, anything less won’t get it done. For me this means a demo account just doesn’t do it. I toy around but I get bored and distracted easily. I started trading a real life account way too early and before I was consistently profitable. Picked being profitable most of the time step by step along the way, and I am still learning day by day. Sure I have a demo account and every trader should have one. It’s very educational and even fun to toy around from time to time. I spend 3, 4 days a month fooling around on a demo account. There is stuff you do not wanna try out on your real account trust me it’s not fun to open a position 100 times the size you thought you were opening.

All in all, if you have the personality and the drive to learn the ropes on a demo account, by all means go for it. If you can get yourself to tread those 100.000 fake dollars as real ones, that’s great. But I can’t. I am not rich and not looking for a get rick quick scheme. I started trading with 100 real euros and even that amount get’s me to focus and be serious a million times more than any fake amount. Like TheLastBear said, if you KNOW you are just playing a racing game and there is no REAL consequence to smashing up your car at 300km/h. It just doesn’t work as a training for real life for some people. One of my best mates could play racing simulator games all day trying to shave 1/1000th of a second of his best lap time while fine-tuning his cars setup. He could wait patiently lap after lap to find a gap or overtake a car with a smart pitstop strategy, he could learn on a demo account. If I couldn’t pass the car in front of me within 2 laps, I went looking for a gap that wasn’t really there mostly ending up crashing. But hey, it’s just a game… I am not a reckless driver in real life at all, I am very well aware of my mortality and the dangers of driving.

Trading a demo is really good to start with, especially to help ensure you can execute positions on the platform without making mistakes. However, demo trading lacks the emotions of trading real money.

I’m a big believer in demo accounts. But as people before me said, it’s a matter of personality. Yes, you don’t play with real money, but for me that didn’t change anything. I had a goal, and opening stupid positions wasn’t gonna teach me anything, so I played like with real money, I had no reason to fool around, it WAS serious to me. When I opened the actual account and put my money in it, I was as ready as I could be, and saved myself a lot of trouble. That doesn’t mean I’m making some crazy profits thanks to the demo, all I’m saying is that the demo was a great way for me to start.
And comparing the demo to driving is not right. For me it is like the idiotic first job you get fresh out of school when you’re supposed to know stuff, but no one trusts you to do anything by yourself (you included) :wink:

As someone new to trading, my view is that being successful on a demo account won’t necessarily mean I can replicate that on a live account, but I’m pretty sure to replicate being crap on a live account if I’m crap on a demo account.

[So for myself I’m going to demo first & see if I can pass that hurdle.]

Definitely we should practice with demo account. I practiced only positioning sell/buy orders with demo account and jumped into real account. The result was losing 90$ in 3 days.
Now I am practicing with demo, also trading in real account in very carefully.

Its called having no faith, the undiscipled trader. We all lose (regularly). Believe in your system bro and step by step :slight_smile: