Project the cash result of any trade before you place it — or reconcile a trade after it has closed. Enter your direction, entry and exit prices, and lot size, and the calculator returns the profit or loss in your account currency, along with the move in pips. Works for forex, indices, commodities and CFDs.
These calculators are for educational purposes only. Trading leveraged products carries a high level of risk and may not be suitable for all investors.
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- Account currency. Select the currency your account is denominated in. Profit and loss are converted into this currency.
- Instrument. Search and select the instrument you traded or plan to trade. This sets the pip definition, contract size and quote currency.
- Direction. Choose Buy / long if you bought and want to sell higher, or Sell / short if you sold and want to buy back lower.
- Lot size. Enter the size of the position — 1.0 for one standard lot, 0.1 for a mini, 0.01 for a micro, or any custom size your broker supports.
- Entry price. The price you entered at.
- Exit price. The price you exited at, or the price you plan to exit at if you’re projecting.
- Hit Calculate profit / loss. The calculator returns the cash P&L in your account currency and the move in pips.
A worked example
Imagine you have a USD account and you took a 0.5-lot long EUR/USD trade from 1.0800, exiting at 1.0875.
- Account currency: USD
- Instrument: EUR/USD
- Direction: Buy / long
- Lot size: 0.5
- Entry price: 1.0800
- Exit price: 1.0875 → 75 pips of favourable movement
EUR/USD on 0.5 lots is worth $5 per pip for a USD account. A 75-pip move long therefore returns $375 in profit. Flip the direction to Sell / short with the same prices and the calculator returns a $375 loss, since you’d have been on the wrong side of the move.
When to use it
- Risk-to-reward sanity check. Before placing a trade, run the calculator twice — once with your stop as the exit, once with your target as the exit. If reward is less than twice your risk, the setup may not be worth taking.
- Scenario planning. Compare exits at different levels — full target, partial target, runner exit — to decide which exit strategy fits the setup best.
- Reconciling broker statements. If a closed trade in your account doesn’t match what you expected, plug the numbers in. Small mismatches are usually spread or commission; large ones are worth chasing with the broker.
- Logging trades from notes. If you recorded entry, exit and lot size in a journal but not the cash result, this rebuilds the P&L cleanly.
- Comparing positions across instruments. The same 50-pip move on different instruments produces wildly different cash results. Use the calculator to see what each setup is really paying.
The formula
Show the maths
For a long trade:
P&L = (Exit price − Entry price) × Contract size × Lot size
For a short trade:
P&L = (Entry price − Exit price) × Contract size × Lot size
The result is in the quote currency. It is then converted into your account currency:
P&L (account currency) = P&L (quote currency) ÷ Quote-to-account FX rate
Pip count is derived from |Exit − Entry| ÷ Pip size, where pip size is 0.01 for JPY pairs and 0.0001 for most other forex pairs.
The calculator does not include spread, commission, swap or other broker fees — the figure is the gross result of the price move.
Common mistakes
- Forgetting costs. The calculator gives gross P&L. Real-world results subtract the spread you paid, any commission, and any overnight swap charges. For short-held intraday trades that’s usually small; for swing trades it can matter.
- Wrong direction. A short trade with an exit above the entry shows as a loss; a long trade with the exit below entry shows as a loss. Make sure direction matches what you actually did.
- Confusing bid and ask. Entries and exits in real trades are taken at different sides of the spread. For projections you can use mid prices; for reconciliation, use the exact fill prices on the broker statement.
- Mixing up lot conventions. 1.0 is a standard lot, not “one trade.” Confirm the lot size you entered matches the one you placed.
Related calculators
- Lot Size Calculator — work out the right size before you trade so the projected loss matches your risk rule.
- Position Size Calculator — size the trade off entry and stop prices instead of a pip distance.
- Pip Value Calculator — see what each pip is worth before projecting full-trade P&L.
These calculators are for educational purposes only. Trading leveraged products carries a high level of risk and may not be suitable for all investors.