In 2026 Topstep offers three Trading Combine account sizes: $50K ($3,000 profit target, $2,000 Max Loss Limit, 5 contracts / 50 micros, $49/mo promo), $100K ($6,000 target, $3,000 MLL, 10 contracts / 100 micros, $99/mo promo), and $150K ($9,000 target, $4,500 MLL, 15 contracts / 150 micros, $149/mo promo). Every size uses a 1.5-to-1 profit-to-drawdown ratio. The $50K has the most forgiving percentage math (4% drawdown vs 3% on $100K and $150K), which is why most experienced Topstep traders recommend starting there. Multiple $50K accounts are often more capital-efficient than a single larger one. This page covers every number you need to choose a size and the strategic reasons to pick each.
Topstep offers three Trading Combine account sizes in 2026: $50,000, $100,000, and $150,000. Every size uses the same structural rule set — a trailing Maximum Loss Limit, a consistency objective on the path to passing, and a Daily Loss Limit that functions as a guardrail on non-TopstepX platforms. What differs between sizes is the dollar value of each threshold and the contract limits.
| Account size | Profit target | Max Loss Limit | Daily Loss Limit | Contracts (std / micro) | Monthly (promo) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $50K | $3,000 | $2,000 | $1,000 | 5 / 50 | $49 |
| $100K | $6,000 | $3,000 | $2,000 | 10 / 100 | $99 |
| $150K | $9,000 | $4,500 | $3,000 | 15 / 150 | $149 |
Three patterns are worth noticing in that table before drilling into each size individually. First, the profit target is exactly 1.5 times the Max Loss Limit on every account. Second, the Daily Loss Limit is exactly half the Max Loss Limit on every account. Third, the contract limits scale linearly with account size at a 10:1 micro-to-standard ratio (5 standard = 50 micros on $50K, etc.). These ratios hold across every tier, which makes the sizing decision primarily about dollar exposure and monthly cost, not about changed mechanics.
A subtle fourth pattern matters for percentage-minded traders: the percentage drawdown is NOT constant across account sizes. $2,000 on $50K is 4% drawdown room. $3,000 on $100K is 3%. $4,500 on $150K is 3%. The $50K gives you a full 1% extra percentage buffer — that is the single most important reason most experienced Topstep traders recommend starting with $50K accounts even when they can afford larger.
The $50K is Topstep's most-purchased Combine and the one most new traders use as an entry point. The math is straightforward: a $3,000 profit target, a $2,000 trailing Max Loss Limit, and a $1,000 Daily Loss Limit that resets each session.
Profit target: $3,000 = 6% of starting balance. You can pass in as few as two trading days (minimum days is tied to the Consistency Target, not the account size directly). Historically Topstep required 10 minimum days; that requirement has been relaxed in recent rule revisions — always verify current minimum days on Topstep's help centre.
Max Loss Limit: $2,000 below starting balance. The MLL is trailing — it rises by the full amount of each end-of-day profit and stops trailing once it reaches your starting balance ($50,000). Once the MLL equals the starting balance, it locks at $50,000 and stops moving. Until that lock happens, every winning day tightens your effective room.
Daily Loss Limit: $1,000. This limit resets at 5:00 PM CT. If your intraday loss on a single session hits $1,000, trading is halted for that session. The DLL applies on third-party platforms (NinjaTrader, Tradovate, TradingView); on TopstepX there is no DLL on accounts created after August 2024.
Contract limits: Maximum 5 standard contracts or 50 micros at any time. You can mix and match — a 3 ES + 20 MES position counts as 5 ES-equivalents. The limit is on total open position size, not per-order.
Monthly cost: The promotional price is $49/month, which is the widely advertised rate. The standard non-promo rate is higher ($165/month historically, though this has shifted as Topstep restructured pricing paths). Combined with the $149 activation fee on the Standard Path (or no activation fee on the more expensive No Activation Fee Path), total cost from evaluation to funded is roughly $198 in the best case, more if you take multiple months to pass.
The 4% drawdown room (vs 3% on larger accounts) gives you extra buffer for the trailing MLL. The lowest monthly cost ($49 promo) minimises downside if you end up taking multiple attempts. The 50-micro contract limit is more than enough for any realistic risk-managed strategy. And if you run into scaling issues after passing, Topstep allows multiple $50K funded accounts simultaneously — which is often more capital-efficient than a single $150K.
The $100K Combine offers twice the buying power of the $50K at roughly twice the cost. The $6,000 profit target is a 6% target on starting balance, same percentage as the $50K. The $3,000 Max Loss Limit is 3% of starting balance — one full percentage point tighter than the $50K's 4%.
Who fits the $100K: Experienced traders with a proven strategy who know their average daily P&L range and have concluded that $50K contract limits (5 standard / 50 micros) do not give them enough room to trade their preferred size. A scalper running 2-point ES scalps at 3 contracts sees no benefit from $100K. A swing-intraday trader averaging 10-point ES moves at 2 contracts may benefit from the extra size room.
The tightening trade-off: Going from 4% (on $50K) to 3% (on $100K) drawdown room is a real reduction in error budget. If your strategy has a normal 2% daily drawdown range, you are eating 67% of your buffer on a single bad day at $100K vs 50% at $50K. Traders who move to $100K without realising this sometimes blow through the MLL faster than expected.
Cost: $99/month promotional ($325 standard). With activation fee, roughly $247-$400 first-pass depending on path chosen. Double the $50K cost, double the buying power, one-third tighter drawdown percentage.
The $150K is Topstep's largest Combine size. The $9,000 profit target is 6% of starting balance (same as the other sizes in percentage terms). The $4,500 Max Loss Limit is 3% of starting balance (same percentage as $100K, still tighter than $50K's 4%).
Who fits the $150K: Experienced prop firm traders who have already been funded at smaller sizes, have a repeatable process, and want the extra size for higher-confidence setups. The 15-contract limit (150 micros) gives room for dedicated portfolio-style position management — splitting size across multiple instruments rather than scaling up a single position.
Contract limit usage: 15 standard contracts is rarely fully used even by aggressive traders. A full 15 ES contracts represents $11,250 of risk per 1-tick move — well beyond what the $4,500 MLL can absorb. The more realistic usage is 5-8 contracts on ES combined with another 5-8 on a second instrument (NQ, CL, or GC). The 15-contract limit exists to enable multi-instrument portfolio trading, not size concentration.
Cost: $149/month promotional ($375 standard). With activation fee, roughly $278-$450 first-pass depending on path chosen. Highest monthly cost, highest buying power, same tight 3% drawdown as $100K.
The 1.5:1 profit-to-drawdown ratio is not arbitrary. Topstep is effectively saying: to pass, you need to make a dollar and a half of profit for every dollar of risk you are given. With a 1:2 reward-to-risk strategy and a 50% win rate — a reasonable target for a competent day trader — the expected value per trade is positive, and over enough trades, you converge on the profit target before exhausting your drawdown.
The trailing nature of the MLL adds friction to this math. Every winning day reduces your effective drawdown buffer by the amount of the win. If you make $800 on Day 1, your new MLL is $800 higher, which means a losing streak after that peak has less room before the limit. Traders who calculate "I have $2,000 to lose so I can absorb a few bad days" miscalculate — once you have profits in the account, your effective room is smaller than $2,000.
The 50% DLL-to-MLL ratio is also deliberate. Topstep wants a daily circuit breaker to prevent the kind of single-session blowout where one bad day eats your entire evaluation. On a $50K account with a $1,000 DLL, you can have a rough day without exhausting your full MLL — you halt at $1,000 down and resume the next session with $1,000 of buffer remaining.
In February 2026, Topstep restructured pricing to offer two paths on the Trading Combine: a Standard Path (lower monthly cost, activation fee after passing) and a No Activation Fee Path (higher monthly cost, no activation fee after passing). The promotional pricing most traders encounter is the Standard Path at $49/$99/$149 per month.
| Account size | Standard monthly | Activation fee | Total (1-month pass) | Total (2-month pass) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $50K Combine | $49 | $149 | $198 | $247 |
| $100K Combine | $99 | $149 | $248 | $347 |
| $150K Combine | $149 | $149 | $298 | $447 |
The No Activation Fee Path raises the monthly cost but eliminates the $149 activation fee. For traders who expect to pass in one or two months, the Standard Path is typically cheaper. For traders who might take longer — especially those using Topstep as a developmental environment rather than a pass-and-go evaluation — the No Activation Fee Path can end up similar in total cost and simpler to budget.
Pricing is verified on Topstep's current dashboard. Both paths are subject to periodic promotional rates and regional tax adjustments. Check the current rate on Topstep's site before purchasing.
Every Topstep Combine permits standard futures contracts and their micro equivalents at a 10:1 conversion ratio: one standard ES counts the same as 10 MES micros toward your contract limit. The specific permitted products are CME Group futures — ES/MES, NQ/MNQ, YM/MYM, RTY/M2K on equity indices, plus CL/MCL, NG/MNG on energies, and GC/MGC, SI/SIL on metals.
For new traders, micros are strongly preferred. A single ES contract has a tick value of $12.50, so a 10-tick move is $125. A single MES (micro) has a tick value of $1.25, so a 10-tick move is $12.50. Trading micros lets you express positions in finer increments — instead of jumping from 2 ES to 3 ES (a 50% size increase), you can move from 20 MES to 25 MES (a 25% increase). That granularity matters when the consistency objective and daily loss limit are both sensitive to single-trade P&L.
On a $50K account with a $1,000 DLL, a single 4-point loss on one ES contract is $200 — manageable. The same 4-point loss on 3 ES contracts is $600 — 60% of your DLL used in one trade. Sizing at micros (30 MES instead of 3 ES, same effective position) lets you stop out at smaller P&L increments if your thesis is wrong before the full position is at risk.
You are new to prop firms, testing Topstep's process, or unsure about your strategy's fit with the trailing MLL. The 4% drawdown is the most forgiving percentage math, and the $49 monthly cost minimises financial downside if your first attempt or two does not pass.
You have prior prop firm experience elsewhere (Apex, MFFU, TPT) and know your average daily range. Your strategy benefits from trading 6-10 standard contracts, and the $3,000 MLL is comfortable relative to your typical daily drawdown. Skip $50K if you would be under-sized on its limits.
You have already passed and run a funded account at Topstep or elsewhere, you want multi-instrument portfolio sizing, and you are comfortable with the tight 3% drawdown. The $150K is rarely the right first Combine — it is a scale-up option after you have proven the process on a smaller size.
Topstep allows multiple simultaneous funded accounts. A trader who passes five $50K Combines and converts each to an Express Funded Account has $250,000 of combined buying power — more than a single $150K, and with a better drawdown structure.
| Strategy | Buying power | Monthly cost | Total MLL | Drawdown % |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5× $50K | $250,000 | 5 × $49 = $245 | $10,000 | 4% per account |
| 1× $150K | $150,000 | $149 | $4,500 | 3% |
| 2× $150K | $300,000 | 2 × $149 = $298 | $9,000 | 3% per account |
The 5-account strategy has clear advantages: more total buying power, more forgiving drawdown percentage per account, and redundancy (if one account busts, you have four others still active). The trade-offs are higher monthly cost ($245 vs $149), higher activation fee exposure if you pass multiple at once ($149 × number of passes), and operational complexity — running five accounts manually is cumbersome unless you have a copier.
This is where a NinjaTrader trade copier shifts the math. With a copier running lead-to-follower replication, the operational complexity of managing five accounts drops to roughly the same as managing one. You place the trade once on the lead account, and the copier mirrors it to the other four. The higher buying power and better drawdown percentages become essentially free — you pay the additional Topstep subscriptions but not the attention tax.
Our copy trades across Apex accounts guide walks through the exact same strategy for Apex Trader Funding, and the logic applies directly to Topstep — run multiple smaller accounts rather than one larger one, and use a copier to make it tractable.
Account size does not change based on platform choice — a $50K Combine is $50K whether you trade it on TopstepX, NinjaTrader, or Tradovate. But some rules differ by platform.
On TopstepX (mandatory for new combines since July 2025, optional for legacy accounts), there is no Daily Loss Limit on accounts created or reset after August 2024. The only enforcement point is the trailing Max Loss Limit. Topstep also reports that TopstepX traders have approximately 86% higher pass rates compared to third-party platforms — likely a combination of TopstepX's built-in risk controls (personal lockout, profit lock, trade limiter) and the commission-free structure on funded accounts.
On NinjaTrader, Tradovate, and other third-party platforms (for legacy account holders), the Daily Loss Limit is enforced as described. Commissions apply as normal on funded accounts through the broker. If you are a legacy holder trading on NinjaTrader, your effective rules are slightly stricter (DLL enforced) than a new TopstepX trader.
After all the math, the practical recommendation for most traders is: start with a single $50K Combine. The reasons are consistent across experience levels.
There are exceptions. If you already have a funded track record from Apex or MFFU, your strategy is mature, and the $50K contract limit is too tight for how you trade, skip straight to $100K. If you are established and running this purely as capital deployment, $150K makes sense as a scale unit.
For the full rules context that accompanies these account sizes — the trailing drawdown mechanics, consistency rule, payout paths, and the Express Funded Account transition — see our Topstep Combine rules 2026 complete reference and how to pass a Topstep combine step-by-step guide.