Win rate is the number of winning trades divided by the number of closed trades, shown as a percentage. If 44 of your last 100 trades closed in profit, your win rate is 44%. On its own it says how often you are right, not whether you make money — that also depends on how big the wins are compared with the losses.
What is the win rate formula?
Win rate = winning trades ÷ closed trades × 100
A winning trade is one whose result after swap and commission is above zero. The awkward case is a trade that closes at exactly zero, usually after the stop was moved to entry. Some tools leave those out of the count; others keep them in the total, where they lower the percentage. Neither is wrong, but you need to know which one you are reading before comparing numbers.
Worked example
Over a month you close 50 trades: 22 make money, 26 lose and 2 close at exactly zero. Counting every closed trade, the win rate is 22 ÷ 50 = 44%. Leaving the two zero trades out, it is 22 ÷ 48 = 45.8%. Same trades, two honest answers.
Why is win rate not enough on its own?
Because the size of each win matters as much as how often it comes. A trader who wins 70% of the time but takes $50 profits against $150 losses loses money; a trader who wins 35% of the time with $300 wins against $100 losses makes it. The minimum win rate you need is set by your average win compared with your average loss — that threshold is the break-even win rate.
What are the common traps?
- Taking profits early to protect it. Closing winners at the first sign of a pullback pushes the win rate up while the average win shrinks, and the account often ends worse off.
- Never closing losers. A losing position that stays open is not counted until it closes. A high win rate with several large open losses is not a high win rate.
- Too few trades. Seven wins out of ten is 70%, but the next ten could easily be four. Judge a win rate over dozens of trades, ideally of the same setup.
Win rate in ApeX Journal
ApeX Journal counts a win as a closed trade whose net result, after swap and commission, is above zero, and divides by every closed trade in the range — so a trade that closes at exactly zero counts against the win rate rather than being dropped. The Dashboard shows it next to the change from the previous period of the same length, and the summary below gives the average win and average loss needed to judge it. Analytics also splits the win rate by trading session.
Questions
What is a good win rate in trading?
There is no single good number, because it depends on your reward to risk. With wins twice the size of losses, anything above 33% makes money; with wins half the size of losses, you need more than 67%. Compare your win rate with your own break-even win rate, not with someone else's percentage.
Can I be profitable with a win rate under 50%?
Yes, as long as the average win is large enough. At a 40% win rate, wins that average 1.5 times the size of losses already break even, and anything larger is profitable. Many trend-following approaches run below 40% for this reason.
Do break-even trades count in the win rate?
It depends on the tool. In ApeX Journal a trade that closes at exactly zero after costs is not a win but stays in the total, so it lowers the win rate slightly. A trade that closes a little above zero because of a buffer on the stop counts as a win.