Like many other traders, MetaTrader 4 is the one trading platform I have used for years. So I thought, why not write a complete beginner’s guide for MetaTrader 4?
In this MetaTrader 4 tutorial, I’ll give you a quick and easy rundown of everything you must know to set up MetaTrader 4, trade with MT4, and do a lot of other things.
This MetaTrader 4 guide will help traders master how to use the MT4 platform through step-by-step tutorials, screenshots, and detailed explanations.
MetaTrader 4 is a platform for trading forex and CFDs. It is used to trade on the financial markets and study more about them. MetaTrader 4 gives traders access to advanced trading operations in a fast, secure, and reliable environment. Because of the features it has, it has become one of the most popular trading platforms for professionals. You simply download, install, and begin trading.
One of the most popular trading software every designed by MetaQuotes.
In this “How to use” guide for MetaTrader 4, I explain in detail how to use almost all of the platform’s features. Let’s begin!
MetaTrader 4 begins with its complete setup for 32 and 64 bit. You may have either a Windows PC or a Mac, but the official MetaTrader 4 website already addresses no need to worry about the way to set up. The video tutorial there will navigate you to the complete setup of MT4 on whatever device you have.
After you’ve downloaded the platform, the next step in setting up MetaTrader 4 is to log in. When you first open MT4, it should ask you for your account information. If it doesn’t, you can click on the “File” tab in the top left corner of the platform and then choose “Login to Trade Account.” Then you can either put in your demo trading account information or your full trading account information.
Your MetaTrader 4 setup is complete. There is no longer a specific way to log out of MT4. If you don’t want MT4 to remember your login information, make sure that “Save Account Information” is not checked when you log in for the first time. Then, when you close MT4, you will be logged out automatically.
Let’s look at how to use MetaTrader 4 to trade forex (MT4). Using the “Order” window and then placing an instant order on the market is the easiest way to place a trade in MetaTrader 4. Click “Window” at the top of the MT4 platform and then “New Window” to choose the currency pair you want to trade. Then you can either click “New Order” on the MT4 toolbar or press F9 to open an “Order” window.
To trade at the market bid or offer, you would put your desired trade size (in lots) in the ‘Volume’ box and click ‘Sell or Buy’ with ‘Market Execution’ selected as the order type.
The “Market Execution” setting in MetaTrader 4 allows you to place an order immediately. Of course, trading at the market is not the only way to make a trade in MetaTrader 4.
You can also go to buy or sell with a limit or stop order by using the “Type” dropdown menu. This is how to trade on MetaTrader 4 at certain levels away from the current market price instead of immediately away from the current price.
We debate MT4 vs MT5 in an insightful article.
Going short on the market is selling when you don’t have a long position. To do this, you would just have to open a sell trade (as demonstrated in the screenshot image above).
A trader needs more information than just how to use MetaTrader 4 to make a trade, of course. After you’ve started a trade, there will come a time when you’ll want to end it.
So, how do I get out of a MetaTrader 4 trade? Choose the “Trade” tab from the “Terminal” layout. You can summon up or dismiss the “Terminal” window by pressing CTRL+T. In the “Trade” section of the “Terminal” layout, you can see a list of all the trades you have open. To cancel an order, right-click on it and choose “Close Order.”
This opens a window called “Order.” To end your trade, click the yellow “Close” button. So, if you have more than two open positions in MetaTrader 4 and want to close one of them, this manual method is the way to do it because you can choose which trade you want to close.
This manual method is not the only way to get out of a trade in MetaTrader 4, though. You can also close by using a stop loss or limit order.
In the “Order” window, there are places for you to type in a “Stop Loss” level and a “Take Profit” level. If you click on either arrow in the ‘Stop Loss’ field, the box will automatically fill with the current market price. On the tick chart on the left, your proposed stop level will be compared to the current bid and offer prices.
In order to place a limit order while closing a position, you simply enter a target price level in the ‘Take Profit’ field in the ‘Order’ window. You can also go for a limit order to open up a position.
To do this, you’ll need to change the ‘Type’ field from ‘Market Execution’ to ‘Pending Order.’ Then, in the “Pending Order Type” dropdown menu, you can choose “Buy Limit” or “Sell Limit,” depending on what you need.
When you open a trade and add a stop-loss or take-profit order, the order levels are expressed in absolute market levels by default. Once you have placed a stop or limit order in this way, you can go to the “Trade” tab in the “Terminal” window (press CTRL+T to open or close this window) and right-click on the trade you want to change or delete and choose “Modify” or “Delete Order.”
This opens an “Order” window where you can change your order levels in terms of points away from the current market price. To change how MT4 works so that you can set stop and limit orders in pips by default, you would need to run a script or an EA (Expert Advisor).
In MetaTrader 4, a trade’s volume is the number of lots that make up the size of the trade. As we’ve already talked about, when you open a trade, you need to put a number in the ‘Volume’ field of the ‘Order’ layout/
Once you have placed a position in a certain market, you can increase the volume (or position size) by opening another position in the same direction in the same market (at a new price), or you can decrease the volume by part-closing your position.
Trading CFDs on shares with MT4 isn’t too different from trading forex. In MT4, you can easily see a list of share CFD prices by opening the “Market Watch” window (CTRL+M). You can open a price chart from that list by right-clicking on the “Symbol” you want to see and choose “Chart Window.”
You can also click “Window” at the top of the MT4 platform, then “New Window,” and then “Share CFDs.” This will give you access to a list of the stocks you can trade. When you have the share you want to click in a chart window, you can open an “Order” window by clicking “New Order” on the toolbar.
From there, you just have to choose the size of your trade and decide whether you want to trade at the market or use a limit or stop order.
If the stock you want to trade is not shown in the “Market Watch” window, you may want to learn to add stocks to MetaTrader 4. This is simple; just use the keyboard shortcut CTRL+U and look in the navigation tree for the Share CFDs folders.
Just click “Show” and then “Close” in “Market Watch” to add to the list that is shown. This is how to add CFDs to MetaTrader 4. The price you want will now be the last thing listed in the “Market Watch” window.
Use the shortcut CTRL+M to open the “Market Watch” window. Right-click anywhere in the window and choose “Symbols.” You can also use the shortcut CTRL+U to get there quickly. Look in the navigation tree for folders called “Cash Indices.” By expanding them, you can see the stock index CFDs that are available.
To add one to your “Market Watch,” click on it and click “Show.” Once you’re finished with the “Symbols” window, click “Close,” and your new instrument should show up beneath the “Market Watch” window.
Adding commodities to MT4 is a lot like what was said above about how to add CFDs on stocks and indices. For example, you want to add Silver and Gold to MetaTrader 4. Use the keyboard shortcut CTRL+U to open the ‘Symbols’ window. Look for the folders that say “Spot Metals.” When you open the “Spot Metals 1” folder, you can see the words “GOLD” and “SILVER.”
Choose what you want to add, then select the “Show” and “Close” buttons. The chosen instrument will now be at the bottom of the list of prices in the “Market Watch” window. To open or close the “Market Watch” window, press CTRL+M. If you’re not sure what to do, right-click on the “Market Watch” window and choose “Show All.” This will show you all the instruments you can use.
Just like what was said above, if there is a currency pair that you want to trade but can’t see in “Market Watch,” you can use the hotkey “CTRL+U” to open the “Symbols” window and watch the navigation layout for any pairs that you would like to add.
To add a pair, simply select the symbol and then click “Show.” You can also right-click in the “Market Watch” window and choose “Show All” to see all the instruments you can trade.
You now know how to use the MT4 platform to set up MetaTrader 4 and make trades. But this platform can be used for more than just trading. The next part of this MT4 tutorial will cover the rest of MT4’s features.
After setting up MetaTrader 4 and starting to trade, one of the first things you’ll do is set up the MetaTrader 4 charts. MetaTrader 4 is one of the known platforms, but it can be hard to set up the charts.
Find out how MT4 stacks up against its biggest rival known as cTrader.
When you start up MT4 after setting up MetaTrader 4, you will see a chart. This is a chart with the settings that come with MetaTrader 4. But some traders don’t find these settings useful for trading and don’t like how they look.
First, you can choose between a candlestick chart, a line chart, and a bar chart. You can change the style of the chart by clicking the corresponding icon in the toolbar at the top of the platform (in the middle, next to the icons for zooming in and out).
After you choose a chart, the next step in this part of the MetaTrader 4 setup is to choose a colour scheme. Having a different colour scheme for when the price goes up or down can help.
You can do this by doing the following:
Right-click on the chart and click Properties.
On the Colors tab, you can choose the colours you want to use for the chart’s preferred parts.
You can pick:
After you choose your colour scheme and chart style, you might want to prefer the gridlines. The grid lines are not an essential part of the chart, and they can make it look crowded and hard to read.
Once your chart looks the way you want it to, the following step in this section of MetaTrader 4 setup is to automate this procedure, so you don’t have to manually choose these settings every time you view a chart.
To do this, you will need to save the chart template:
From now on, you can load this Template every time you open a chart.
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Depending on what kind of technical analysis you use, the way you set up your MetaTrader 4 charts will be different. Your chosen indicators, oscillators, and other technical analysis tools will appear on the chart.
For instance:
Trend indicators: They can be added to the candles on the chart or shown in the background as a bar or line graph. These can help you determine where the price will likely go next.
Oscillators: Oscillators are always at the bottom of the chart, not on the candles themselves. They tell you the best times to get into and get out of a market.
No matter what trading style and technical analysis you choose in the MetaTrader 4 setup, you can save your trading style and technical analysis as a profile. Your profile is automatically saved when you close the MetaTrader 4 platform. Your work will be there when you open it again.
You can quickly upload a profile from your MetaTrader 4 account to another account. The MetaTrader 4 trading platform has this very useful feature.
Professor André Machado, a well-known trader and one of Brazil’s best technical analysts, created the Tabajara Index. He created it so that he could find market trends with more certainty.
At this point in setting up MetaTrader 4, to use the Tabajara in MetaTrader 4, do the following:
The indicator will figure out the pattern of the candles and give the right colour to the candles whose high is below the average and whose low is above the average.
With MT4, you can view your trade history in the “Terminal” window, which you can open and close with the keyboard shortcut “CTRL+T.” Click on the “Account History” tab in the “Terminal” window. If you right-click on any part of this window, you’ll see a menu with options like “Last 3 Months,” “All History,” and “Last Month.”
You can also save a detailed report. This covers all of the necessary trading information, such as the price, size, MetaTrader 4 trade execution time, and profit/loss. To print your account history in MetaTrader 4, just choose “Save as Report” or “Save as Detailed Report.”
The report will be saved as an “HTML” file. If you open the file, your web browser will open. Click the “Edit” tab in your web browser and choose “Select All” or use the shortcut CTRL+A.
Once you’ve chosen everything, right-click and select “Copy.” Now, open a word processing application, like Microsoft Word or Google Docs, and paste the copied data. The account balance data can then be formatted however you want, and you can print using the app’s print function.
With MT4, it’s simple to display a trade from your account history right on a chart. Open the “Terminal” window (CTRL+T hot key to open and close) and click on the “Account History” tab. Select trade by clicking with the mouse in the window and drag it to the chart window.
Now, the trade’s instrument will be shown on the chart, and the opening and closing prices will be marked with small arrows connected by a dashed line. When you move your cursor over the arrows, the information about the trade will show up as “hover text.”
In the same way as above, the “Terminal” window lets you see open trades. If you click on the “Trade” tab, you can see all of your open trades.
To check your trading account balance, launch the “Terminal” window (CTRL+T to open and shut) and choose the “Trade” tab. You’ll be able to examine your “Balance,” “Equity,” and “Free Margin.”
Withdrawing money from MT4 is easy and only takes a few easy steps when you use Trader’s Room:
Many of the most important trading indicators are already built into MT4. In the “Navigator” window, you can find a list of these in the “Indicators” folder. By installing custom indicators to your trading platform, you can increase the number of indicators you can use.
Installing MetaTrader Supreme Edition is the best way to add more indicators to your list. MTSE is a custom add-on for MetaTrader 4 and MetaTrader 5 that was made by experts in the field. It has a hand-picked set of extra indicators and trading tools that make your MetaTrader trading platform more powerful.
You can also use this platform to download custom indicators that other developers have coded.
Search on the MT4 file that you just downloaded and copy it to your clipboard. Then, in MT4, click on “File” and choose “Open Data Folder.” Open the “MQL4” file and then the “Indicators” folder from the window that appears. Put the copied indicator in this folder. Then, start MT4 again. Your list of indicators in the “Navigator” should now include the new custom indicator.
To switch off an indicator, use “CTRL+I” to view your list of indicators. Click on the indicator you wish to disable, and then click the “Delete” option.
WMA stands for “weighted moving average,” which is a type of moving average. The Moving Average Indicator in MT4 includes the WMA. First, double-click on “Moving Average” in the “Indicators” folder of your “Navigator” to add the MA indicator to your chart.
This brings up a window that lets you set the parameters of the indicator. “MA Method” tells you which type of moving average you’ll be using. When you choose “Linear Weighted,” the “Linear Weighted Moving Average (LWMA)” appears.
In MT4, it’s easy to change the way a chart looks. To do this, right-click on your chart, choose “Properties,” and then click on the “Colors” tab. From there, you can change the colours of the background, the foreground, the up and down candles, and so on. After doing that, you might want to save that look and feel for future use.
Save it as a template to do this. Right-click on your chart again, then choose “Template” and “Save Template” this time. Once you’ve saved a template, it’s easy to add it to a new chart. For that, simply right-click on your chart, choose “Template,” and then “Load Template.” On the MQL4 Website, you can learn more about “Templates” and “Profiles.”
The addition of trendlines to charts may be a very useful tool. When you use the “Draw” tool (the button with the diagonal line on the toolbar), a line is produced by default that extends all the way to the right edge of the screen. However, there may be times when you like a shorter line.
For this, you must:
If you want a trendline to show up the next time you look at a certain currency pair, you’ll need to save your work as a template.
To do so, either choose “Chart” from the platform’s menu bar, then “Template,” and then “Save Template,” or right-click on your chart and select “Template,” and then “Save Template.” If you close MT4 and later decide you want your analysis lines back, just go to “Template” and click on “Load Template.”
Then, choose the name of the file where you saved your work, and all the trendlines you saved will come back.
ATR Indicator - Average True Range — 2023Here’s how you can trade on MetaTrader 4 with more than one account at the same time and make the same trades on all of them. First, we need to look at how to use multiple accounts in MetaTrader 4. To do this, you’ll need to install more than one version of the MT4 platform on your computer and set each one to go to a different folder.
Then, you can log in to each account using a different version of MT4 in a different place. Each account needs to be set up to allow automated trading and linking to dynamic libraries so that trades can be copied. To do so, go to the top of the window and choose “Tools,” then “Options.”
Select the “Expert Advisors” tab from the “Options” window and check the boxes next to “Allow Automated Trading” and “Allow DLL Imports.” The last step is to install an MT4 trade-copying application.
If you search for MetaTrader 4 trade copy programmes on the MQL5 Website, you will find many examples. So, one way to link your existing account to another computer is to use a copying Expert Advisor.
The timezone shown in your MT4 platform is determined by the MetaTrader 4 brokers you connect with. It is not possible to change it on your device. As a result, the only true way to change the time on MetaTrader 4 is to utilise a broker that operates in a different timezone.
Select ‘File’ from the top menu of the MT4 platform, followed by ‘Login to Trade Account.’ The subsequent window offers a ‘Server’ option, from which you may choose a different server.
The hotkey combination ‘CTRL+Y’ separators allow you to easily distinguish days on your hourly MT4 charts. On a daily chart, the separators will indicate the start of the month.
Simply right-click on a chart and choose ‘Properties’ to return it to its default settings. Choose the ‘Common’ tab from the ‘Properties’ window, then click the ‘Reset’ button at the bottom. If you want to restore your whole platform to its default state, the ‘nuclear’ option is to reinstall MT4 on your device.
If you leave MT4 open for an extended period of time, you may see gaps in the chart data. You may fix this with a simple refresh – right-click on the chart and pick ‘Refresh’ from the menu. You may need to take a step further and perform a complete manual reset of the chart data.
F2 will open up the ‘History Center,’ where you can scan through the directory for the instrument and time range you want to update. When you double-click on the time period, the window will be filled with data values. By clicking on the first cell, holding down the shift key, scrolling all the way to the bottom, and then clicking on the last cell, you may select all of the values.
Except for one row, all of the values will be removed when you click ‘Delete.’ To remove the last row, click ‘Delete’ once again. Your chart will now display the message ‘Waiting to Update.’ If it does not completely repopulate, try switching to a different time period and then returning. You may also need to right-click and choose ‘Refresh.’ Any gaps in your data should be filled when the chart repopulates.
If you don’t have enough free RAM on your device, having many charts open that have been running for a long time can run down MT4. One way to fix this problem is to cut down on the amount of data shown in each chart.
You can do this by clicking “Tools” on the menu bar at the top of the platform and then “Options” (or by pressing CTRL+O, which is a shortcut). In this window, change the size of the “Max” bars in the history and the “Max” bars in the chart. Slowness can also be fixed by restarting MT4 on a regular basis and shutting down Expert Advisors that aren’t being used.
Expert Advisors, or EAs, are programmes that do things automatically in MT4 based on what their developer tells them to do. You can think of them as robots that trade and analyse. By opening the “MetaEditor,” you can make an EA. The minimal way to accomplish this is to press F4.
You may also right-click on Expert Advisors in the “Navigator” section of MT4 and choose “Create” in the “MetaEditor.” There is also a toolbar icon that performs this.
Click “New” in the MetaEditor to start the MQL4 Wizard, which will help guide you through creating a new Expert Advisor. It might be easier for you to download and install an EA than to make your own, though. Setting up an EA in MT4 is very similar to setting up a custom indicator.
First, find the file for the EA on your computer and copy it to the clipboard. Go to “File” in MT4 and choose “Open Data Folder.” Launch the MQL4 folder and then the “Experts” folder in the new window. Put the EA file you copied into this folder.
MT4 will need to be started up again. Your list of EAs in the “Navigator” should now include the new EA. To start using a chart, just click and drag to it.
MT4 also have a strategy tester or “backtesting” tool built in. This is a great way to test strategies, EAs and indicators risk free.
If you bought a script from a store, make sure to read and follow any installation instructions that came with it. Adding a script is like installing an EA in most ways (as described above).
Put a copy of the file on the clipboard. Click on the “File” tab, which is at the top left of the MT4 platform, and then click on “Open Data Folder.” Open the MQL4 folder and look for a folder called “Scripts.” Open the “Scripts” folder and put the file you copied there.
An MT4 tutorial will not show you how to use this functionality. If you understand what Artificial Neural Networks are and are proficient in programming in MQL4, the language used by MT4, you have the abilities required to create an artificial neural network using MT4.
For that, you will need to use the Fast Artificial Neural Network Library (FANN) to create a network that can be trained to interpret market data and trading as part of an EA.
We hope this MT4 tutorial on how to use MetaTrader 4 was helpful. Of course, the best way to really understand these tips and techniques is to try them out for yourself with MetaTrader 4. A MetaTrader 4 demo account setup is the best way to play around with MetaTrader 4 without risking any money.
Demo trading is a great way to try out trading on the best Forex trading platform and learn how it works. When you are ready for real trading and have built up your confidence through demo trades, you will need a live trading account. The setup of a MetaTrader 4 demo account is pretty easy to understand. Will a potential MetaTrader 6 bring any new features to the table?
The MQL4 language can be used to make programmes for MetaTrader 4. The MQL4 Website is the best place to start if you want to learn how to code for MT4.
