What keeps MT4 relevant after two decades
MetaQuotes stopped issuing new MT4 licences some time ago, pushing brokers toward MT5. But most retail forex traders stayed put. The reason is straightforward: MT4 works, and people trust what works. More than a decade's worth of custom indicators, Expert Advisors, and community scripts were built for MT4. Switching to MT5 means rewriting that entire library, and few people would rather keep trading than recoding.
I spent time testing MT4 and MT5 side by side, and the gap is less dramatic than the marketing suggests. MT5 has a few extras such as more timeframes and a built-in economic calendar, but the core charting is nearly identical. Unless you need MT5-specific features, there's no compelling reason to switch.
MT4 setup: what the manual doesn't tell you
Installation takes a few minutes. Where people waste time is configuration. Out of the box, MT4 loads with the full details four charts tiled across a single workspace. Close all of them and start fresh with the pairs you care about.
Templates are worth setting up early. Set up your go-to indicators on one chart, then save it as a template. After that you can load it onto other charts without redoing the work. Small thing, but over time it makes a difference.
Something most people miss: go to Tools > Options > Charts and check "Show ask line." MT4 only shows the bid price by default, which makes entries appear wrong by the spread amount.
How reliable is MT4 backtesting?
MT4 comes with a backtester that gives you the ability to run Expert Advisors against historical data. But here's the thing: the accuracy of those results comes down to your tick data. The default history data is not real tick data, meaning gaps between real data points are estimated with made-up prices. For anything beyond a rough sanity check, grab proper historical data.
Modelling quality tells you more than the bottom-line PnL. Below 90% means the results aren't trustworthy. People occasionally share screenshots with 25% modelling quality and ask why their live results don't match.
Backtesting is where MT4 earns its reputation, but only if you feed it decent data.
Custom indicators on MT4: worth the effort?
MT4 ships with 30 default technical indicators. Most traders never touch them all. But the real depth is in community-made indicators built with MQL4. You can find over 2,000 options, ranging from simple moving average variations to elaborate signal panels.
Adding a custom indicator is simple: place the .ex4 or .mq4 file into your MQL4/Indicators folder, restart MT4, and the indicator shows up in the Navigator panel. One thing to watch is quality control. Community indicators range from excellent to broken. A few are genuinely useful. Some haven't been updated since 2015 and may crash your terminal.
Before installing anything, verify the last update date and if other traders mention bugs. Bad code doesn't only show wrong data — it can lag the whole terminal.
The MT4 risk controls you're probably not using
You'll find several built-in risk management features that a lot of people skip over. The most useful is maximum deviation in the trade execution window. This controls how much slippage is acceptable on market orders. If you don't set it and the broker can fill you at whatever price comes through.
Stop losses are obvious, but MT4's trailing stop feature is underused. Click on an open trade, choose Trailing Stop, and define the pip amount. The stop moves with the trade goes your way. It won't suit every approach, but for trend-following it removes the temptation to micromanage the trade.
None of this is complicated to set up and the difference in discipline is noticeable over time.
Expert Advisors — before you trust a robot with your money
Automated trading through Expert Advisors have obvious appeal: define your rules and let the machine execute. In reality, most EAs fail to deliver over any decent time period. Those marketed using perfect backtest curves are usually fitted to past data — they performed well on the specific data they were tested on and stop working when market conditions change.
That doesn't mean all EAs are worthless. A few people develop personal EAs for one particular setup: opening trades at session opens, managing position sizing, or exiting positions at set levels. That kind of automation tend to work because they handle mechanical tasks without needing discretion.
If you're evaluating EAs, use a demo account for at least two to three months. Running it forward in real time reveals more than any backtest.
MT4 beyond the desktop
The platform was designed for Windows. If you're on macOS face friction. The old method was emulation, which was functional but had display glitches and stability problems. Certain brokers now offer native Mac apps wrapped around Wine under the hood, which are better but remain wrappers at the end of the day.
The mobile apps, on both Apple and Android devices, are genuinely useful for monitoring your account and making quick adjustments. Serious charting work on a mobile device is pushing it, but closing a trade on the go is worth having.
Check whether your broker offers a native Mac build or just a wrapper — it makes a real difference day to day.