A crypto prop firm free trial is the cheapest place to find out whether your strategy survives the rules. Firms offer different free routes: a trial that only shows you the platform teaches you the buttons, while a trial measured against the paid plan’s loss limits shows whether your strategy fits them.
QATS offers a free sandbox account with virtual funds, where orders go through the same server-side risk checks as purchased accounts. Its limits come from a fixed test rule set rather than from the plan you intend to buy, so a log of that plan’s limits does the measuring. This guide explains what it includes, what it cannot do, and a simple method for using any trial to test how your trading behaves against a daily limit and an end-of-day trailing floor.
What a free prop firm trial usually is
Some firms offer a demo of their platform, sometimes without the evaluation’s loss limits. Others offer a free, time-limited version of a challenge that cannot lead to funding, or a separate sandbox account that is often aimed at testing bots, APIs and alerts as well as trade ideas. Whatever it is called, ask three questions.
- Do the same loss limits apply as on the paid evaluation?
- Can you reset the trial and start again?
- Does anything you do on it count toward a paid account? Assume not unless the firm says otherwise.
What the free QATS sandbox gives you
- $100,000 in virtual funds on a separate account with its own balance, positions, history and keys.
- A choice of market and price venue when you create it: Crypto or TradFi, priced from Binance or Bybit market data.
- Orders checked by the same server-side risk machinery as purchased QATS accounts, with simulated execution on Binance or Bybit market data.
- A fixed test rule set, not a copy of the plan you intend to buy, so keep your own log of that plan’s limits.
- No purchase: it needs a QATS account with a verified email, not a paid challenge.
- A fresh start when you need one: a sandbox reset retires the old test account, cancels its orders, revokes its keys and webhooks, and opens a new one.
What a crypto prop firm free trial cannot do
A trial is deliberately limited, and the limits are the point: a trial with nothing at stake is where mistakes should happen. On the QATS sandbox you cannot:
- Get paid. Sandbox funds are virtual and cannot be withdrawn, and sandbox trading earns no performance payouts.
- Count it toward an evaluation. Nothing on the sandbox qualifies a challenge or a funded account; a paid evaluation starts its own days and profit from zero.
- Reach an exchange. Execution is simulated, so no sandbox order is sent to an exchange order book.
- Reuse credentials. Sandbox keys and purchased-account keys are not interchangeable, and the sandbox has its own API base URL.
- Pick the size. The virtual balance is $100,000 whatever account you intend to buy.
How orders reach the sandbox
The QATS sandbox is built around connected trading. You send orders with a sandbox key through the Trader API, or with a sandbox webhook from TradingView alerts and Pine strategies; both trade the same virtual account. The sandbox terminal is a read-only view of that activity: balance, equity, margin, realised and unrealised P&L, the chart, orders and fills.
A discretionary trader can still rehearse by sending planned trades through TradingView alerts, then reading the result in the sandbox terminal.
How to test drawdown behaviour on a free trial
- Pick the plan you intend to buy and write its limits down as percentages. A QATS Crypto evaluation combines a 10% profit target, a 4% daily loss limit, a 6% end-of-day trailing maximum loss that stops trailing at the starting balance, a 40% consistency rule and 2 minimum trading days.
- Size by percentage, not dollars. Risk the same share of the balance per trade that you would on the paid account, so the $100,000 sandbox log behaves like a scaled copy of the plan you intend to buy.
- Log every day: the closing balance, the worst dip from where the day started, and the floor the plan would set for the next day.
- Run it long enough to include bad days: a few weeks of your normal routine, not just the minimum trading days.
- Score the run on margin, not profit: how much of the daily limit did the worst day use, and how close did equity come to the floor?
- Change one thing at a time, such as risk per trade or a personal daily stop, then reset and run again.
A shadow floor log, step by step
The log below applies the Crypto plan’s percentages at sandbox scale; because every QATS Crypto size uses the same percentages, the same log works whichever size you intend to buy. The floor starts 6% below the starting balance, moves up only at the daily close and stops trailing once it reaches the starting balance.
TradFi evaluations have no separate daily cap, so a TradFi log needs only the floor column. On a paid account, Rules & objectives and Risk center show the live limits; on a trial you keep the log yourself.
| Day | Close | Worst dip from the day’s start | Room above the floor at that point | Floor for the next day |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Start | $100,000 | — | — | $94,000 |
| Day 1 | $101,200 | $1,500 (38% of the daily limit) | $4,500 | $95,200 |
| Day 2 | $100,400 | $2,100 (53% of the daily limit) | $3,900 | $95,200 (unchanged) |
| Day 3 | $103,000 | $900 (23% of the daily limit) | $4,300 | $97,000 |
| Day 4 | $106,500 | $1,200 (30% of the daily limit) | $4,800 | $100,000 (locked at the start) |
When to move from the trial to a paid evaluation
- Your worst day over the run used well under the daily limit, ideally no more than about half of it.
- Equity never came close to the shadow floor, including on the days you broke your own rules.
- Your profit path would have met the 40% best-day rule without one outsized day.
- If you automate, your bot or alerts ran on the sandbox without surprises in size, fills or retries.
- You can explain every losing day in your log.
Frequently asked questions
01Does QATS offer a free trial?
QATS offers a free sandbox account with $100,000 in virtual funds, checked by the same server-side risk machinery as purchased accounts under a fixed test rule set. It needs a QATS account with a verified email; no paid challenge is required.
02Can I withdraw profits from the sandbox?
No. Sandbox funds are virtual, cannot be withdrawn and earn no performance payouts. Payouts come only from an eligible funded account, after identity verification and a finance review.
03Does sandbox trading count toward an evaluation?
No. Sandbox results do not qualify a challenge or a funded account, and a paid evaluation counts its trading days and profit from its own start.
04Can I trade the sandbox by hand?
The sandbox terminal is a read-only view; orders reach the sandbox through connections such as a sandbox API key or a sandbox TradingView webhook. A manual trader can rehearse by sending planned trades through TradingView alerts.
Educational content, not investment advice. QATS evaluations and initial funded accounts are simulated; payouts depend on eligibility, verification and the applicable agreement.