Prop Firm Inactivity Rules: How Long Can an Account Sit Idle?

A prop firm inactivity rule (the longest an evaluation or funded account may go without a trade before the firm acts) runs from 5 trading days to 30 days at the futures firms we checked in November 2026. The length is only half of it: Lucid Trading wants at least $1 of net profit or loss in the window, Apex reportedly wants two days of $50 or more net profit, and MyFundedFutures live accounts have no inactivity rule.

Key takeaway

There is no industry-wide inactivity window. As of November 2026, Bulenox suspends a Master account after more than five trading days without a trade, MyFundedFutures one-time-model accounts can be closed and FundedNext Direct accounts are deactivated after 7 calendar days, and Topstep, Lucid and FundedNext allow 30 days. The definition counts as much as the length: Lucid deletes an account without $1 of net profit or loss in 30 calendar days, so plan around your strictest account and the December 25 and January 1 closures.

How long can a prop firm account go without a trade?

Between 5 trading days and 30 days, depending on the firm and the account stage, as of November 2026. The shortest windows are 5 trading days on Bulenox and Earn2Trade funded accounts and one week at MyFundedFutures, FundedNext Direct, Tradeify and Take Profit Trader PRO; the longest are 30 days at Topstep, Lucid, FundedNext and Apex.

Check the firm's current rules before buying, because these pages move: MyFundedFutures brought in its 7-day rule for accounts bought under its one-time payment model from August 25, 2026. Other terms in the table are defined in our prop firm glossary of rules.

Firm (accounts)	Window	Day type	What resets the clock	At the limit
Bulenox (Master)	More than 5	Trading days	One trade	Suspended without notice, remaining balance forfeited
Earn2Trade (funded)	5 consecutive	Trading days	A trade, or a notified break	Terminated
MyFundedFutures (evaluation and sim funded, one-time model)	7 consecutive	Calendar days	A placed trade	Could be closed; sim funded profits forfeited
MyFundedFutures (live)	None	None	Nothing needed	No inactivity rule
FundedNext Futures (Direct)	7 consecutive	Calendar days	One executed trade	Deactivated
FundedNext Futures (Challenge, FundedNext Account)	30 consecutive	Calendar days, weekends included	One executed trade	Deactivated; Challenge can be reset, funded needs a new purchase
Tradeify (per TradeDupe)	1 trade per Monday to Friday week	Weeks	One trade, counted per account	Not confirmed
Take Profit Trader (PRO, per Propvator)	1 traded day per Sunday to Friday week	Weeks	A round-trip trade	Not confirmed
Alpha Futures (Evaluation, Qualified)	10	Trading days	A trade of any size	Not stated beyond data archiving
Topstep (Express Funded, Live Funded)	More than 30	Not stated	Trading activity	May be closed; no hold
Topstep Labs (static Combine, Challenge)	30, plus 90-day expiry	Not stated	A placed trade	Account closes
Lucid Trading (evaluation and funded)	30	Calendar days	At least $1 net profit or loss	Permanently deleted
Apex (Performance Accounts, per TraderPayout)	Rolling 30	Calendar days	2 days of $50 or more net profit	Notices at day 15 and 20, closed at day 30

Compiled by Phoenix Technologies from each firm's pages, read on 12 November 2026; the Apex, Tradeify and Take Profit Trader rows rest on the named secondary sources because those firms' pages refused our requests. Two common numbers do not survive it: the idea that every firm allows 30 days is wrong for every weekly and 5-trading-day row, and a 60-day window, sometimes quoted as typical, appears at none of the futures firms checked.

Three columns decide your risk: the day type, what resets the clock and what happens at the limit. Topstep's and Lucid's accounts share the number 30 and differ in all three: unstated days against calendar days, "trading activity" against a $1 result, "may be closed" against permanent deletion.

Topstep and Lucid both say 30 days, yet they differ in day type, in what counts as activity and in the penalty. Compare whole rows, not just the number.

Does the inactivity rule count calendar days or trading days?

Both, and the firm's wording decides it: Bulenox, Earn2Trade and Alpha Futures count trading days, while Lucid, MyFundedFutures and FundedNext count calendar days, weekends included. Topstep does not say which it uses, so the safe reading of its 30 days is calendar days.

In a normal week 5 trading days span 7 calendar days and 10 trading days span 14, so Bulenox's rule behaves like a weekly rule and Alpha's like a fortnightly one. FundedNext's trading objectives page spells out its side: "The window counts calendar days, including weekends, and resets when at least one trade is executed."

Several roundups, El Trader Financiado's among them, list Bulenox and Earn2Trade as a bare 5 days without saying which kind. The firms' own documents say trading days: section 5.7 of the Bulenox Master Account Agreement reads "If Account is inactive for more than five trading days, it will be suspended without notice." Earn2Trade's guide to funded accounts says "five consecutive trading days".

Of the firms we checked, only one publishes the minute its day ticks over. FundedNext's help center states: "The inactivity count increases each day at 04:01:00 PM CT." That is one minute after the 4:00 PM CT CME close, so the count appears to follow the futures trade date rather than midnight; on that reading, a trade on the Sunday evening session belongs to Monday.

Picture every window as a bar on one baseline in calendar days: the 5-trading-day rules and the weekly rules near 7, Alpha Futures near 14, and Topstep, Lucid, FundedNext and Apex at 30. Over Christmas only the trading-day bars stretch: from a last trade on Friday December 18, 2026, 5 trading days reach 10 calendar days and 10 trading days reach 18.

In a normal week a 5-trading-day rule is a weekly rule; over Christmas the same rule gives you 10 calendar days, while a 7-calendar-day rule gives you no extra time.

Does any trade reset the inactivity clock?

At most firms one filled trade resets it, but not at three: Lucid needs at least $1 of net profit or loss, Take Profit Trader reportedly needs a round trip, and Apex reportedly needs profit days. None of the rules we read counts a login, an open chart or a resting order; each is written around a trade.

A fill resets the clock at FundedNext, MyFundedFutures and Alpha Futures, whose inactivity rule adds "(does not matter size of trade)". At Take Profit Trader it counts only once closed into a round trip, at Lucid only if the window shows $1 of net profit or loss, and at Apex only on a day of $50 or more net profit, twice in 30 days.

A fill is enough at most firms, but each later gate filters out trades that passed the one before. A seconds-long scratch is a round trip, yet it can still fail Lucid's $1 and Apex's $50 tests.

The popular line that any small fill resets the counter, whatever its result, fails at three firms. Take Profit Trader, per Propvator's summary of its PRO rules, defines a traded day by a round-trip trade, so an open position held all week may not count.

Apex has the strictest definition. According to TraderPayout's August 2026 summary of Apex's policy, "you must record at least 2 trading days with $50 or more in net profit within every rolling 30-day period." Apex's own pages refused our requests in November 2026, and Legacy Performance Accounts bought before March 1, 2026 follow a separate, looser policy that secondary sources describe differently. Topstep, by contrast, asks only for "trading activity", one more difference in the Apex and Topstep comparison.

What happens when a prop firm account goes inactive?

Anything from a warning to permanent deletion: the outcome depends on the firm more than on the number of days. Bulenox suspends without notice and keeps the remaining balance, Lucid deletes the account, and Topstep says only that its funded accounts "may be closed".

Picture a ladder of seven rungs, mildest at the bottom. Apex, per TraderPayout, sends notices at day 15 and day 20 before closing the account at day 30. FundedNext deactivates, though a breached Challenge can be reset.

The upper rungs cost money. FundedNext adds: "FundedNext Accounts can not be reset; a new purchase is required to continue trading." Bulenox's agreement states "Any remaining balance will be forfeited back to Bulenox." MyFundedFutures forfeits all profits on a sim funded account, and at the top, Lucid's inactivity policy says such accounts "will be deemed abandoned and will be permanently deleted from our systems."

The penalty depends on the firm more than on the window length. The rungs that cost money start where an account cannot be reset.

Lucid also deletes breached accounts after 30 days if they are not reset, so a blown account left alone disappears on the same clock; whether a reset beats a fresh purchase is covered in reset versus a new account. Lost profit from inactivity sits beside the other reasons payouts are refused. No firm publishes how many accounts it closes for inactivity.

Do inactivity rules apply to evaluations and live accounts?

Often to evaluations, and at MyFundedFutures not to live accounts. FundedNext Challenges (30 calendar days), Lucid evaluations (30), Alpha Futures Evaluations (10 trading days) and MyFundedFutures evaluations bought under its one-time model (7) all carry the rule.

Topstep splits by product. Topstep Labs accounts, its one-time static Combines and Challenges, close after 30 days without a trade and expire after 90 days regardless. We found no inactivity rule for the standard subscription Trading Combine as of November 2026: it keeps billing instead, and Topstep's refund policy covers an unused charge only with no trading activity and contact "within 28 days of the charge".

Calendar clocks keep running while you wait, which belongs in any plan for how long an evaluation takes. Apex's rule does not cover evaluations, according to TraderPayout, and we found no evaluation-stage rule on the Bulenox and Earn2Trade pages we read. MyFundedFutures subscribers from before August 25, 2026 keep their "existing price, plan, billing cycle, and terms".

The strictest stage is often the simulated one. MyFundedFutures gives sim funded accounts 7 calendar days, yet its live account FAQ says: "All our live accounts, no matter what account type you were originally on, have no inactivity timer/rule." The same page adds, "You are welcome to leave your account sitting."

Can you pause a funded account for a vacation?

Sometimes, if you ask first, and at Topstep not at all. MyFundedFutures' inactivity rule says "Traders taking a vacation should notify the customer support team if they will not be trading for more than 7 days." Earn2Trade terminates only "unscheduled" absences.

Topstep's Express Funded Account parameters are blunt: "XFAs with no trading activity for more than 30 days may be closed. XFAs can't be put on hold." Earn2Trade allows time off "as long as they notify the prop trading firm." We found no vacation process on the Lucid, FundedNext, Bulenox or Alpha Futures pages we read.

The belief that you can always pause a funded account is only partly true. Where notice is accepted, send it before your last trade and keep the written reply with its dates.

How do Christmas and New Year closures move your deadline?

They pull 7-day calendar deadlines earlier and push trading-day deadlines later. CME futures other than crypto are closed on Friday December 25, 2026, and CME has no trading for the January 1, 2027 trade date, so a trader whose last trade is Friday December 18 must trade a 7-calendar-day account by Thursday December 24, Christmas Eve, whose hours CME confirms nearer the date.

According to CrossTrade's summary of CME's 2027 calendar, "There is no trading for the January 1 trade date, and Globex reopens at the usual Sunday open on January 3." Hello Weekends notes that CME finalises holiday hours about two weeks before each holiday, so confirm them on CME Group's own calendar; our CME trading calendar and Sunday reopen explains why a Sunday session carries Monday's date.

Window	Firms using it	Last safe trade date	Calendar days after Dec 18
7 calendar days	MyFundedFutures, FundedNext Direct	Thu Dec 24, 2026	6
5 trading days	Bulenox, Earn2Trade	Mon Dec 28, 2026	10
10 trading days	Alpha Futures	Tue Jan 5, 2027	18
30 calendar days	Lucid, FundedNext	Fri Jan 15, 2027	28

Computed by Phoenix Technologies; method: illustrative last trade on Friday December 18, 2026; a calendar window ends at last trade plus N days, rolled back to the latest CME trade date; a trading-day window counts N CME trade dates, skipping weekends, December 25 and January 1. Step by step:

7 calendar days: December 18 plus 7 is Friday December 25, a CME closure, so the trade rolls back to Thursday December 24.
5 trading days: count December 21, 22, 23 and 24, skip December 25, and December 28 is the fifth. Bulenox's "more than five" could allow December 29; use the stricter date.
10 trading days: continue with December 29, 30 and 31, skip January 1, then January 4, and January 5 is the tenth.
30 calendar days: December 18 plus 30 is Sunday January 17, whose evening session carries Monday January 18's trade date, so the last safe trade date is Friday January 15.

A 30-day account gives you 28 calendar days but only 18 CME sessions, against 22 for a window starting January 4. Any 7-day window starting December 18 to December 31 holds 4 sessions instead of 5.

Picture the calendar from December 15, 2026 to January 15, 2027, with two shaded closed days on December 25 and January 1. Four bars start at the last trade on December 18.

The Christmas closure pulls a 7-day deadline back to Christmas Eve and pushes trading-day deadlines into the new year.

How do you keep several prop accounts active at once?

Schedule around the shortest window you hold, and count every account on its own: Tradeify, according to TradeDupe's guide to Tradeify accounts, counts the weekly trade "per account, not per user". The rules on how many accounts a firm allows decide how many clocks you are running.

Take an illustrative fleet of three accounts with 7, 30 and 30 calendar-day windows. Traded on separate schedules, the minimum is about 53 + 13 + 13 = 79 touches a year (365 days divided by each window, rounded up). If one trade reaches all three at once, it is about 53, because the 7-day account sets the pace, the same logic as in holding accounts at several firms.

Thor replicates each trade from one master account to unlimited follower accounts from cloud servers, so a session you trade on the master reaches every connected account; no firm page we found says a copied fill counts differently from a manual one. It does not help if you are not trading at all, and it copies results too: the same loss lands in every account, and a scratch still fails Apex's $50 test.

A trade placed only to reset a clock carries its own risk. A seconds-long scratch feeds the microscalping tests some firms run, and may not clear Lucid's $1, which Lucid does not say is measured before or after commissions. Advice to place a tiny trade every 21 days, which PropFirmScan gives, would breach every weekly and 5-trading-day rule in the first table.

If you hold any 7-day or weekly account, trade it in every calendar week.
If an account counts trading days (Bulenox, Earn2Trade, Alpha Futures), count sessions, not dates: holidays add calendar days.
If the firm sets a result test (Lucid, Apex), check the account's net result for the window, not just the fill.
If you will be away longer than your shortest window, write to the firms that accept notice before you leave, and decide which other accounts you are prepared to lose.
If an account stays alive only through trades you would not otherwise take, ask whether it is worth the risk those trades carry.

Go deeper

Frequently asked questions

Does a losing trade count as activity?

Yes at most firms we checked, because FundedNext, MyFundedFutures and Alpha Futures count a trade regardless of result. Lucid counts a net profit or loss of at least $1, so a small loss qualifies there too. Apex is the exception: per TraderPayout, only days with $50 or more of net profit count.

Do I get a warning before my account is closed for inactivity?

It depends on the firm. Apex reportedly sends notices at day 15 and day 20, while the Bulenox agreement says the account is suspended without notice. Topstep and MyFundedFutures use "may be closed" and "could be closed", which leaves the timing to the firm.

Does a trade copied onto my account count as activity?

No firm page we read treats a copied trade differently from a manual one. The fill is a trade in that account, so it counts under the same test as any other trade. Result tests still apply, so a copied trade at Lucid or Apex must meet the $1 or $50 threshold like any other.

Does the MyFundedFutures 7-day rule apply to older subscription accounts?

No. The 7-day rule covers accounts bought under the one-time payment model from August 25, 2026, sim funded accounts included. MyFundedFutures says current subscribers keep their existing price, plan, billing cycle and terms.

Can I recover a Lucid account deleted for inactivity?

Lucid describes the deletion as permanent, and its page offers no route back. Breached Lucid accounts are also deleted after 30 days if they are not reset, so a reset has to happen inside that window.

Does the standard Topstep Trading Combine expire if I do not trade?

We found no inactivity rule for the subscription Trading Combine as of November 2026; it keeps rebilling whether you trade or not. Topstep refunds a forgotten charge only if the account has no trading activity and you contact support within 28 days of the charge. The one-time Topstep Labs accounts are different: they close after 30 days without a trade and expire after 90 days.

What does Alpha Futures do after 10 trading days without a trade?

Alpha Futures requires a trade at least once every 10 trading days and explains the reason: "Trading platforms archive trading data after 10 inactive trading days." Its page does not state any further consequence, so ask support before relying on that gap.

Does holding an open position keep a prop account active?

Not reliably. Take Profit Trader, per Propvator, counts a traded day only on a round-trip trade, so a position held open all week may not count. Lucid and Apex test the net result in the window rather than the fill, and the other rules we read are written around executed trades.