Short version: PropSizer is free. Download it from the Market, drop it on the chart, drag the ENTRY and STOP LOSS lines to your planned prices, read the lot size in the first line. Set your risk once in the inputs. It never places an order.
1. Prerequisites
MetaTrader 5, any account (demo or live), an mql5.com account for the download. Algo Trading is not required, PropSizer does not trade. For the news line the economic calendar has to be active in the terminal (View → Toolbox → Calendar; on by default).
2. Download and install
Market tab in the terminal → "PropSizer" → download Free, or PropSizer on the MQL5 Market. It then sits under Navigator → Expert Advisors → Market → PropSizer. As a free product it has no activation limit.
3. Drop it on the chart
PropSizer belongs on every chart you trade, each with its own lines. After dropping it, a blue ENTRY line appears at the current price and a red STOP LOSS line one ATR below. The first text line in the top left reads, for example:
LONG | 109 pts | risk 124.76 EUR (EQ 0.25%) | Lots: 11.4
Direction from the lines (stop below entry = LONG, above = SHORT), stop distance in points, money at risk, lot size. Drag the lines, the line follows. Key R resets both lines to the market. If the one-click trading panel (Alt+T) is visible, the text moves below it automatically.
4. Set the risk once
| Input | Default | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Risk per trade (%) | 0.25 | percent of equity (or balance, see next row) |
| Fixed risk in account currency | 0 | replaces the percentage when > 0 |
| Base: equity or balance | equity | equity includes floating P/L, the number your firm's daily rule looks at |
| Commission per 1.0 lot round-trip | 0 | your broker's commission; the risk is then calculated net of fees |
Lots are rounded down to the symbol's volume step, never up. If even the minimum lot risks more than allowed, the line says SKIP, with the real risk of the minimum lot.
5. Session candle counter
Numbers every candle from the cash open (1, 2, 3 …) for every visible day in the chart's timeframe. Session detected from the symbol: European indices from 09:00 Frankfurt, US indices from 09:30 New York, both with automatic daylight-saving time, converted to your broker's server time. Unknown symbols show "?" on the button (EU assumed), or you set the open manually in server time (input "Count candles from = Manual"). The chart button in the top right ("Candles EU ON") toggles the counter.
6. News line
Second line: the next event from the MT5 economic calendar for the currencies in the input (default USD, EUR, GBP), within the look-ahead window (default 90 minutes), filtered by importance (default moderate and high). At start PropSizer writes the events of the next 24 hours to the journal; if nothing appears there, the calendar is not loaded in the terminal.
7. Coupling with PropGuardian
If PropGuardian runs on the same account, the third line shows its state: PROTECTING or DAY LOCKED. While the day is locked the lot line shows 0 lots in red, because any new position would be closed anyway. Without PropGuardian it says "not detected on this account" and everything else works as usual.
8. Limits
A calculator only, no order placement. In the strategy tester the economic calendar is not available (a MetaTrader limitation); the news line says so there. Tick value comes from the broker's symbol specification; if the broker reports zero, the line shows n/a instead of guessing.
9. Help
Questions and unrecognised symbols go into the Comments on the product page. Detailed guide in the blog: PropSizer setup guide.