Best Forex Trading Platforms

Pepperstone Has MetaTrader 4 And 4 Other Top Platforms

With 5 distinct types of trading platforms plus 3 social trading trading tools, 2 type of trading accounts and a large range of products, Pepperstone has something for all types of traders.

Key Features With Pepperstone

• Great range of trading platforms
• Some of the lowest spreads on the market
• Fast execution speeds (~30ms in the UK)
• Two account types, both with tight spreads

Trading Accounts

In addition to Pepperstone’s Standard Account, the broker also has a Razor Account. This account type uses Straight-Through-Processing (STP) trading execution to bring you ECN like pricing. With this type of execution, quotes are provided directly from liquidity providers which means there is no dealing desk involved in the trading process. To keep spreads as organic as possible, a brokerage commission of GBP 2.29 (GBP 4.59 round turn) is charged in place of a wider spread (as you see with a standard account).

The Razor account is best for traders wanting the lowest possible spreads. Spreads for the Razor account start from 0.0 pips and for the standard account start from 0.6 pips (but have no commissions) so your costs end up being similar.

Regardless if you trade with commissions or no commissions, Pepperstone is an top forex broker for low spreads. When it comes to no commission spreads, spreads start from 0.6 pips for the EUR/USD and GBP/USD pair. The chart below compares the average spread for the standard account of different brokers such as City Index, CMC Markets and Forex.com using information published on each broker’s website.

Standard Account Spreads	EUR/USD AUD/USD EUR/GBP GBP/USD USD/JPY AUD/JPY EUR/JPY USD/CAD	EUR/USD AUD/USD EUR/GBP GBP/USD USD/JPY AUD/JPY EUR/JPY USD/CAD	EUR/USD AUD/USD EUR/GBP GBP/USD USD/JPY AUD/JPY EUR/JPY USD/CAD	EUR/USD AUD/USD EUR/GBP GBP/USD USD/JPY AUD/JPY EUR/JPY USD/CAD	EUR/USD AUD/USD EUR/GBP GBP/USD USD/JPY AUD/JPY EUR/JPY USD/CAD
	0.77	0.84	1.40	1.19	0.86
	1.20	1.40	1.40	1.50	1.20
	1.13	1.01	1.71	1.66	1.12
	0.80	0.90	1.70	1.80	0.80
	1.30	1.50	1.80	1.70	1.40
	1.10	1.20	1.40	1.50	1.20
	1.30	1.50	1.90	1.80	1.90
	1.30	1.80	1.90	1.90	2.00
	1.24	1.77	1.65	1.81	1.33
	1.70	1.80	2.00	2.20	1.60

Avg. spreads are taken from each broker's website and updated monthly. Last update on 01/11/2022

Lowest Spread US Forex Brokers >>

Looking at this comparison, it is clear Pepperstone is one of the best choices you can make for tight spreads.

In terms of products, Pepperstone provides you with a wide range of financial instruments for trading, allowing you to diversify your portfolio. Over 60 currency pairs are available, major pairs have a leverage of 30:1 and minor/exotic pairs have leverage of 20:1.

If you really want to spread your risk with forex, you can choose from 3 currency indices. This is a US Dollar Index made up of 6 currencies with a large weight to the Europe, Yen and Pound. The other currency indices available are the Europe Index and the Japanese Yen Index. Leverage for all indices is 5:1.

If you prefer to spread bet rather than trade CFDs, all products in the Pepperstone portfolio are available to bet with. To spread bet, you will need to use one of the MetaTrader platforms or cTrader.

Previously, Pepperstone provided access to cryptocurrency markets as well as the above asset classes, however, recent changes to FCA regulations in the UK now mean retail traders cannot trade cryptos such as Bitcoin.

Minimum Deposit And Funding

There is no minimum deposit to open an account with Pepperstone, but it is recommended to start with at least USD $200. To fund your account, you can use a range of different methods including credit/debit card, standard bank transfer and PayPal.

Trading Platforms

Pepperstone offers a choice of 5 trading platforms. These are MetaTrader 4, MetaTrader 5, cTrader, Capitalise.ai and TradingView. Each platform has features that will appeal to different traders, below we cover each platform and help you understand which platform best meets your trading needs.

Choose MetaTrader 4 if you want to be part of the largest forex platform community. This platform just does everything you need to trade forex very well. While beginner to Intermediate traders (and even advanced traders) will find MetaTrader 4 more than meets their needs, If you want more advanced features like extra charts, more backtesting and extra processing power or you want to trade shares with CFDs, then MetaTrader 5 is a better options.

Pepperstone allows scalping and hedging which you can take full advantage of with the use of Expert Advisors and Smart Trader Tools. These tools help you to identify trading opportunities and automate your trading.

On the subject of automating your trading, the Capitalise.ai trading platform is a game changer. With this platform, you can create algorithms to automate your trading for the entire range of Pepperstone financial instruments using plain English in place of code.

If you are an analytical trader then the TradingView platform will best meet your needs. This platform comes with over 100 pre-built indicators, 50+ drawing tools and multi-time frames, if this isn’t enough analytical tools for you, you can also access over 100,000 community built indicators. As a bonus, trading can be done directly through the charts.

Pepperstone also provides 3 social trading platforms, DupliTrade and Pelican and MetaTrader Signals. Social trading allows you to copytrade other successful traders in the community, thus saving you time. You can even automate this copy trading.

Pepperstone Is An Award Winning Broker

Pepperstone is multipi-award winning broker. To highlight the quality of their services, Pepperstone won not 1 but 5 awards at the prestigious Investment Trends Awards in 2022. Awards won include best for client satisfaction, and value for money.

Our Pepperstone Broker Verdict

Pepperstone is a top FX broker with super-fast MT4 execution speeds and ultra-competitive Forex spreads, across the board. Not only that, the broker offers a great range of trading platforms, excellent algorithmic tools, including a range of EAs, and great 24/5 customer support.

View Pepperstone Review >>Visit Pepperstone >>

Trading Station By FXCM Has The Best Charting Software

For the best charting platform out there, look no further than FXCM. Trading Station is the trading platform developed by FXCM for the exclusive use of its clients of all skill levels. With this platform, you will find some of the best analytical tools of any platform on the market.

The broker also combines a number of factors well including:

• Great algorithmic trading platforms
• Advanced trading tools
• Best charting platform: Trading Station
• Low commissions for active traders

Trading Accounts

FXCM has two account types for UK retail traders: their Standard and Active Trader accounts.

Their standard account features zero commissions with average minimum Forex spreads of 1.1 pips, slightly wider than the industry average. To open a standard account, you need $300 and a further $50 to fund each deposit.

For those high-volume traders, FXCM’s active trader account is for you. This is because you’ll receive commissions as low as $5 (round-turn) if you trade between 150M and 500M each month. The account does require a steep minimum deposit of $25,000 so it is only suited for serious traders with large financial resources.

FXCM’s product range is relatively limited but it is growing. You will get the most choice of tradeable markets using Trading Station with 219 stock CFDs available while using MT4 gives you 43 Forex pairs to trade. Spread betting is also available.

Trading Platforms

FXCM offers a great range of trading platforms, in particular, the popular MetaTrader 4 and their excellent proprietary platform, Trading Station.

Trading Station is our recommended trading platform with FXCM. The platform is available for download on your Windows, as a mobile app for Android and iOS and was recently upgraded to HTML5 allowing for optimal functionality with all web browsers.

The desktop version is FXCM’s flagship trading platform though and was built from the ground up based on client feedback. With this platform, you get all the major features FXCM has to offer, including Marketscope 2.0. Marketscope 2.0 is a powerful professional charting package that allows you to access critical market data in real-time, trade directly through the charts and easily edit your orders.

Some 55 built-in indicators are available with this platform but you can add as many as you need via the FXCM app store, including 26 drawing tools and 10 timeframes. Another major feature is that trade automation is permitted, a feature usually only found on mainstream platforms such as MetaTrader 4 and 5. Here you can apply forex strategy backtesting and optimisation to help you achieve the best trading results.

There is also a solid range of speciality and algorithmic platforms, including Quant Connect, Motivewave and Sierra Chart. Each has its own unique advantages to enhance your trading experience.

If you wish to do social trading, FXCM offers the popular ZuluTrade. For $30 a month, you can follow and copy expert individual traders or a group of traders and share their success. ZuluTrade uses algorithms to help you find the best traders in their leading social trading community and then copy their trades with minimum hassle. Best of all, you only pay the traders you copy if you make a profit.

FXCM Broker Verdict

Overall, FXCM is an excellent choice for algorithmic traders, giving users a superior charting experience with automation capability. Their biggest selling point is in their proprietary Trading Station, which comes with great advanced trading tools, while there is also a wide array of related platform options that provide advanced charting tools and support automated trading strategies.

View FXCM Full Review >>Visit FXCM >>

*Your capital is at risk ‘67% of retail CFD accounts lose money’

IG Has A Large Range Of Trading Platforms

IG is one of the oldest brokers, founded in london in 1974. Not only does IG have the best range of trading platforms, but the broker also has one of the best proprietary trading platforms in the industry, with excellent trading and research tools. A big plus with the IG platforms is the inclusion of a guaranteed stop loss.

The broker offers many advantages including:

• Industry beating proprietary platform
• Vast range of markets
• Competitive pricing
• Advanced trading tools

Trading Accounts

IG offers two vastly different retail investor accounts: a CFD or a DMA account

Their CFD account is aimed at beginners, with no commissions (other than share CFDs at 0.18%) and forex spreads starting at 0.6 pips, which is competitive for similar account types.

IG’s DMA account, on the other hand, offers discounts for active traders, depending on your monthly traded FX volume. The forex market spreads you will obtain are very competitive, starting as low as 0.1 pips. This, in addition to low commissions for share CFD trading at 0.1% gives the DMA account a great incentive for high-volume traders with years of experience.

There are funding costs for both accounts, which vary depending on whether you use Visa/Mastercard or PayPal. Bank Transfer incurs no such costs. To open either account, you will need an initial deposit of GBP 250 (using card or PayPal).

IG’s product range is extensive and diverse. Some 100 Forex pairs are available along with a large range of metals, energies. You can even trade some rare tyes of CFD products such as options, treasuries, interest rates. Stocks for international stock exchanges are also available both as CFD and with proper equities.

Trading Platforms

IG Markets offers 4 distinctly different trading platforms, thus allowing you to find the platform that fits your needs. IG Trading Platform is IG’s flagship platform but you can also choose from MetaTrader 4, ProRealTime and L2 Dealer.

IG’s award-winning proprietary trading platform comes in 3 versions. The most powerful version is browser-based and includes all of IG’s best trading features. This includes the full range of trading products, 28 indicators, 17 drawing tools and 4-time frames in a single chart.

Other features include 5 order types including guaranteed stops to protect yourself against more losses than you are able to accept. Monitoring tools such as watchlist, price alerts and Autochartist and ProRealTime integration.

If you prefer to trade via your mobile, then you can download the Android or iOS app or use the progressive web app. The mobile app has many of the same critical features available as the web version but does not offer Autochartist or ProRealTime. DMA trading is also possible but with iOS only. A progressive web app is a browser-based tool with mobile shortcuts.

L2 Dealer is a purpose-built trading platform for traders who wish to have direct market access (DMA) pricing. To access DMA you will need a Forex Direct account for forex trading or a Share DMA account for Share trading. While the platform itself is free, there are additional costs to access shares data and live level 2 pricing.

When trading direct market access (DMA), having an understanding of the overall sentiment of the market can be a major advantage. This is a key feature of IG’s L2 Dealer platform through their live pricing feed which lets you view the order books at the exchange.

If you rely on charting for advanced technical analysis when trading, ProRealTime offers over 100 powerful decision support tools to help with this. ProRealTime is a charting package that can function as a standalone trading platform or add-on to the IG web-based trading platform.

Key features include:

• 115 technical indicators
• 40 Drawing Tools
• An infinite number of timeframes
• Autotrading capabilities with backtesting
• Depth of Market Order Book
• Market scanning tools

ProRealTime is free to use in the first month and will remain free as long as you make 4 trades per month. The platform also has automation capability.

IG Markets Broker Verdict

Overall, IG has a platform for everyone, whether it be their excellent proprietary platform, DMA trading with L2 Dealer, ProRealTime for advanced charting tools or the popular MT4. The broker also offers competitive pricing and a good range of tradable products.

View IG Markets Review >>Visit IG Markets >>

FxPro Is The Best Forex Broker With cTrader

FxPro has been awarded the best cTrader Forex broker with the best UK spread betting platform by our team of expert analysts. This is because many advanced trading tools help FxPro to stand out from the other cTrader brokers.

Other top features of FxPro are:

• Variety of account options
• Full MetaTrader suite
• Transparent pricing
• Great range of trading platforms

Trading Accounts

FxPro has a variety of account types, separated by your choice of trading platform: MT4/MT5, cTrader or FXPro’s own in-house platform. Each account also uses either instant or market execution. Instant execution is subject to requotes but no slippage, while market execution may have some slippage but there are no requotes.

Their MT4/MT5 account is commission free and offers either fixed or variable spreads. Average minimum spreads vary but start at about 1.5 pips, which is fairly high for similar account types (I.E. like a standard account).

FxPro’s cTrader account is where you’ll get the best value, offering commissions from $45 per million USD traded with spread costs as low as 0.3 pips for major pairs.

Lastly, the broker’s own FxPro platform account is somewhat in the middle, acting like a standard account with zero commissions but variable spreads.

With all of their accounts, there is no minimum deposit requirement and zero funding costs either.

FxPro’s product range is decent and you’ll have the best choice if you choose the MT4 or MT5 trading platforms. The broker’s total tradable markets includes 2031 stocks and 69 Forex pairs. FxPro also allows spread betting, which adds more complex instruments to trade.

Trading Platforms

FxPro offers a great range of trading platforms including:

• MetaTrader 4 and 5
• cTrader
• FxPro Platform and Direct App

Not a lot of brokers offer the full MetaTrader suite, which are still amongst the most popular third-party trading platforms in the market. These are available both as desktop or web trader options. Trading Central is another useful charting plugin that can be integrated with MT4 and MT5.

The cTrader trading platform is the second most popular forex trading platform, which is why it has become the leading multi-asset trading platform for many advanced forex traders wanting low trading costs.

From the FxPro trading platform download centre, traders can have access to cTrader for both PC and Mac.

The FxPro cTrader platform is an award-winning platform that comes with the following capabilities:

• Ultra-fast order execution capabilities
• Full live market depth (including VWAP, Standard and Price DOM)
• cTrader Automate (for algorithmic trading)
• Robust charting (including 73 indicators and dozens of drawing tools)

There is also FxPro’s proprietary trading platform, which features slick charting and an intuitive design, available on mobile or as a webtrader.

FxPro Broker Verdict

FxPro was among the first UK CFD brokers to offer cTrader Automated including all the integrated algo trading tools that come with it. When you opt to use FxPro as a broker, you have access to a range of competitive trading platforms that can supply all your trading needs. This, in addition to a variety of account types, execution methods and transparent pricing.

View FxPro Review >>Visit FxPro >>

*Your capital is at risk ‘78.87% of retail CFD accounts lose money’

Plus500 Platform Is Good For Beginners

Plus500 is the largest CFD online broker in the world that comes with its own in-house proprietary trading platform. Plus500 has a rich history being in the online trading business since 2008 when it started serving clients around the world.

Our team of experts has awarded Plus500 as the best forex trading platform for beginners for the following reasons:

• Intuitive proprietary trading platform
• Great selection of markets
• Competitive forex spreads
• Robust charting features

Trading Accounts

Plus 500 only offers a Standard account for UK retail traders, which is a great choice for beginners. This is their commission free account, with average minimum spreads of 0.6 pips, very competitive for a standard account.

To fund an account, you will need to deposit 100 GBP for most methods other than a bank transfer, in which case you’ll need to transfer 500 GBP. There are no additional funding costs though.

Plus500 offers a wide range of markets with over 2000 financial instruments tradeable through the Plus500 trading platform. All of Plus500’s FX product range is tradeable via CFDs with a great variety of markets including 71 Forex, over 1100 stocks and 98 ETFs. As a point of difference, Plus500 also offers 308 options to trade.

Trading Platforms

Plus500 only offers one trading platform but its own proprietary trading platform is intuitive and very simple to use for beginners. The main user interface is designed to help beginners trade in an environment that focuses on simplicity.

You can trade via the web-based trading platform and trading Apps on both iOS and Android. Mobile trading has integrated the same trading features that comes with the Plus500 web-based trading platform. To practice before you start trading live, you have the choice to open a demo account.

Plus 500 Broker Verdict

Overall, for beginner UK forex traders, Plus500 is the recommended option for their user-friendly proprietary trading platform, simple account opening process and reasonable trading costs.

Open a demo account >>Visit Plus500 >>

*Your capital is at risk ‘72% of retail CFD accounts lose money’

eToro Is The Best Social Trading Account

Toro is the world’s leading social trading platform that allows millions of investors to copy trade in real-time. eToro’s innovative social trading technology allows traders around the world to copy other successful traders or to open manual trades in the financial markets.

Our team of experts evaluated eToro alongside other copy trading platforms by being committed to rigorous standards. We awarded eToro the prize of the best social trading network because of the outlined trading features:

• Top social trading network
• World-class copy trading platforms
• Great choice for beginners
• Trusted multi-asset broker

Trading Accounts

Like Plus500, eToro only offers one account option, their Standard account.

There are no commissions with this account and average minimum spreads of 1 pip for major Forex pairs. This is in line with the industry average for similar accounts. You’ll only need $50 to open an account with no additional funding costs.

The other benefit of eToro as a broker is the option of a swap-free account for Islamic traders in the UK which follows Sharia Law. For this, you’ll need $1000 as a minimum deposit.

eToro brings a wide range of assets to its global clientele, including:

• 2691 Stocks
• 263 ETFs
• 49 Currency Pairs
• 30+ Commodities

The wide array of instruments makes eToro one of the best brokers in the UK when it comes to social trading.

Trading Platforms

eToro social network platform connects traders from over 140 countries and lets them mimic the trading activity of the most talented traders. eToro’s proprietary trading platform is recognised around the world for its advantageous social ecosystem. The platform is intuitive, user-friendly and combines the benefits of social trading and self-directed trading.

Professional traders can also share their success inside the eToro social network and generate an extra passive income from their trading ideas. eToro can facilitate communication between a losing trader and a profitable trader in up to 20 languages.

CopyPortfolios is a tool that helps investors to copy an entire portfolio of instruments or traders. This portfolio management tool includes three types of new investment opportunities:

• Market Portfolios
• Top Traders Portfolios
• Partner Portfolios

The Top Trader Portfolio features eToro’s most successful and profitable traders, while the market portfolios include instruments of the same type. If you’re an investment manager, you can create your own CopyPortfolios with eToro.

eToro Broker Verdict

Overall, no UK forex broker comes close to eToro when it comes to the social trading features of eToro. If this feature is what you’re looking for when it comes to a CFD broker in the UK, then you should consider opening a live account or trial a demo account.

Open a demo account >>Visit eToro >>

*Your capital is at risk ‘68% of retail CFD accounts lose money’