Search for an MT5 simulator and you will find four quite different things sold under the same name. One lets you practise clicking buy and sell. One replays an Expert Advisor over old data. One steps through history candle by candle. One tests a rule you drew. Choosing the wrong one wastes weeks, so here is the map.
The four things people mean by an MT5 simulator
| Type | What it simulates | Best question it answers |
|---|---|---|
| Demo account | Live prices, virtual money, real-time clock | Do I understand the platform and my broker's execution? |
| Strategy Tester (built in) | An Expert Advisor run over historical ticks or bars | How did this coded EA behave on past data? |
| Replay simulator (third-party) | History played forward so you place trades by hand | Can I build discretionary skill faster than waiting for live markets? |
| Rule simulator | A rule built from levels and conditions, replayed over history | Would this exact rule have fired when I think it would, and what blocked it? |
None is the "real" simulator. They are tools for different jobs, and most traders eventually use more than one.
1. The demo account
A demo is the simplest simulator and the one every broker offers. You get live prices and virtual funds, which makes it ideal for learning the terminal, order types and your broker's symbols. Its limits are structural. Time passes at the speed of the real market, so you get one day of experience per day. Demo servers are sometimes less stressed than live ones, so fills can be kinder than the real thing. And with nothing at risk, your decisions tend to be braver than they would be with money on the line.
2. The built-in Strategy Tester
MT5 ships with a Strategy Tester that runs an Expert Advisor over historical data, with several modelling modes: every tick, every tick based on real ticks, one-minute OHLC, and open prices only. Visual mode lets you watch it run. It is powerful and free.
The catch is the input. It tests code. If you have a trading idea but not an EA, you must write one in MQL5 first, or buy one, and then trust that the code does what you meant. Plenty of "test failures" are really translation errors between the idea and the code. The modelling mode also matters a great deal: open-prices-only is fast and flattering for strategies that act inside a bar, and real ticks are slow and need quality history.
3. Replay simulators
Third-party replay tools play historical data forward candle by candle, at a speed you choose, while you place trades by hand as if it were live. They are good for one thing: compressing years of screen time into weeks so you can practise reading charts and managing a position. If your goal is to build discretionary skill, this is the right category.
chartTrigger is not this. It does not let you click trades into a replaying chart. If that is what you need, use a tool built for it.
4. A rule simulator
This is the category chartTrigger's Proving Ground belongs to. You build a rule from a drawn level, a template, the Workbench or a plain-English description, and the simulator replays it over past bars using the same evaluator the live engine uses. There is no EA to write. You state the spread, slippage, commission, lot size and starting equity, and the result prints them next to the figures. Trades are drawn on the candles that produced them, and a rule that never fires tells you which condition blocked it and how often.
It works with no broker account, on public price history for forex, gold, indices, crypto and shares, or on your own broker's history when one is connected. The details of how its simulated fills work are in the realism checklist.
Which one should you use?
- New to MetaTrader: a demo account.
- You have or are writing an EA: the Strategy Tester, on real ticks if the data is good.
- You trade by hand and want repetitions: a replay simulator.
- Your idea is "when price does X under conditions Y, alert or trade": a rule simulator, then a paper lane on live prices.
Common questions
Is there an official MT5 simulator?
MetaTrader 5 includes a Strategy Tester that simulates an Expert Advisor over historical data, and brokers offer demo accounts with virtual money. Replay-style simulators for manual practice are third-party tools.
Can I simulate a strategy on MT5 without writing an EA?
Not in the built-in Strategy Tester, which runs coded Expert Advisors. A rule simulator lets you test a rule built from levels and conditions without MQL5.
Is an MT5 demo account a good simulator?
It is good for learning the platform and your broker's execution. It runs in real time, so it builds experience slowly, and with no money at risk it does not test how you behave under pressure.
Does chartTrigger let me practise trading by clicking on historical charts?
No. It simulates automated rules over history and runs them on paper at live prices. For manual replay practice, use a dedicated replay simulator.
Simulate a rule, not a hunch
Build a rule from a drawn level or a plain-English description and replay it over history with the assumptions on the page.
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Risk note. This article is educational material about how chartTrigger works. It is not investment advice, not a recommendation to trade any instrument, and nothing here forecasts results. Trading leveraged products carries a high risk of loss. Any historical simulation referred to is exactly that — a run over past bars under stated spread and slippage assumptions, not an indication of future performance.