Traders, I'm sooooo overwhelmed with the variety of Charting and Trading platforms out there. Which do I choose? I'm evaluating between Sierra Charts, Ninja Trader 8, Metatrader 5. The primary reason I'm choosing these is because there a couple providers of indicators (MBox and some other) support some but not all. Ninja and Meta are the ones that are both supported. I hear amazing things about Sierra, it's stable and customizable but terrible looking UI and hard to use. I hear Ninja is super popular, but slow and unstable.
I'm thinking of signing with AMP Futures which seems to have deals with many platform providers (except Ninja).
I'm overwhelmed. Appreciate guidance. Thanks in advance!
I've being trading Options using ThinkorSwim. It's a great platform but their commissions for futures are expensive. I'm also new to Futures trading.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on futures io?
Sierra has more built-in goodies (Indicators aka Studies) that with Ninja if you wanted to use them you would probably either have to buy from third party vendors, join the elite section here or go back and use NT7 instead of 8 (because there are way more indicators for it in the NT forums) - but NT7 lacks major features like Tabs that both NT8 and sierra have. Why are tabs awesome? cause you can duplicate them.
Also if you have a very old pc (like less than 8gb memory) sierra would be the way to go but really, anyone who is gonna trade futures would probably not be using a very old PC unless they are the type that really hates the forced update problems that plague the modern Windows OS's.
Sierra uses like 1/10th the memory of ninja if I were to make a rough estimate. Or at least no more than 1/5th.
I would just evaluate NT8, SC and MT5 if I were you and see what suits you best. The other platforms probably are best just for people with specific needs (like MultiCharts for tradestation code compatibility)
also if for some reason you needed a ton of charts to be open simultaneously... SC is probably better than Ninja for that. All depends what indicators you use I guess but Ninja can be really slow with a lot of charts.
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@kevinhpchan Spend 3 hours with each platform then make a decision. You mentioned 3 platforms: you should be able to finish it in less then 1 or 2 days. If you run into problems you can always change platforms. Easy.
If I had to do all over again and only had one computer and data feed; knowing what I know now, I would pick Sierra charts. I only use NT8 because I have used it for so long and use 3rd party apps (like Jigsaw, mzPack and OFA) that only run on it. But I concur with others here, SC is the way to go. It has a lighter touch on your computer and that is especially important during heavy volume times. NT, I have found by sad experience, needs to run minimally if you are to try and use it to trade during these times - and I have a very good trading computer and internet connection, and even run NT in a above normal CPU priority. SC also has a good support base, has good volume analysis tools built in and more flexibility in configuring all the indicators and tools it uses.
I have used SuperCharts, Tradestation, eSignal, Multicharts (I also like MC), NT7. Now I do pre-market prep with NT8 and then close the workspace. I trade with only Jigsaw Daytradr (bridge) and OFA running.
Hope that helps.
Full time financial software beta tester. ~When asked what I do for a living.
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I'm an NT8 user, and I hate it. I hate it every single flipping day. I only use them because i'm stubborn. It locks up, freezes, crashes, destroys workspaces, does things you wish it would never do.
NT7 on the other hand is a great tool and the only reason I don't go back is i'm stubborn. I consider myself a 'beta' tester, and it's been out for 2 years. Sure, you should not be beta testing with your live money and such, but I have them on speed dial now. I submit an email about literally every day for new 'feature requests' or 'this is broken please look into' updates.
Please, use SC, or be warned to stay in NT7. NT7, again, is a great tool and I truly love it.
So if you're trying to choose, use SierraCharts or NT7.
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Once you get past the learning curve, it's a pretty amazing platform. There's no one simple answer here @kevinhpchan, you definitely need to investigate them all for yourself. Check them all out, just expect to spend a little more time figuring out how to do things in SC than the others. Muahahahahaaaaa....
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Interesting comments on NT8
I am a discretionary trader and have not had issues with NT8.
Guess I am a a ‘light’ user and NT can handle what I ask of it.
Having said that....I know several peopl,that use Sierra....and it seems superior in terms of stability and the extent of native functionality...especially you want to use order flow/ volume in your trading.
If I was not a lifetime licence holder with Ninja I may have swapped over.
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I will give you a few pros and cons of NinjaTrader.
Cons:
Like others have said, stability has been an issue for them. Late last year I had version 11 crash on me during live trading. After working with their team over there we discovered the bug...... Basically any time you refreshed your trade performance report with a live data feed open and consuming over a certain threshold of memory.... It would crash. They worked on it and fixed in with version 12. This bug was only in version 11 as far as I know. But the point is that live trading users are still beta testers to some extent. I think over the last 2 years they have been perhaps overly ambitious in their releases and didn't do enough internal UAT, so some of the releases have had serious bugs. Some versions are fairly stable though. I still use version 10 for example, it's one of the more stable, low memory consuming versions. Starting in version 11, the DB structure changed, then in 12 they added all the new order flow tools. I think they are up to version 13 or 14 and the memory usage can be high depending on what you are trying to do. But if you get a stable version, keep your DB file small, and don't use sloppy code from bad third party Dev's, it's a fine platform for algo trading. I can't speak to using charts or indicators because I am not familiar with that aspect of it.
Pros:
SIM:
I have taken apart the SIM / testing tools of various platforms over the years and you won't find too many that have the complexity of NinjaTraders. They all have limitations, but NinjaTrader's SIM / Market Replay is significantly more accurate than other retail options.
So if you are trading more of an investing style where you just take a few trades a day and try to hold for 10 - 20 points or something accuracy of testing tools may not be such a big deal. But if you are using limit orders, scalping or doing anything based off of volume analysis that requires accurate fill logic.... You will need tools that are in the ball park with the live market. Else your tools will fail you and not properly prep you for live trading.
Algo Trading:
Every system will have some flavor of algo trading tools available. Ninjatrader uses C# which gives you access to the full library of .Net, so you can use tons of class libraries to do literally anything. C# is not as fast as C++ though. So I would say in terms of AlgoTrading just from a technology perspective: NinjaTrader and MultiCharts. Net both have you covered with Microsoft technology. Trade Station and a few others use something called easy language, which might handle blocking and tackling okay but you won't have as much scale behind it because it is a proprietary made up language as far as I can tell.
So it all depends on your needs I suppose...
Ian
In the analytical world there is no such thing as art, there is only the science you know and the science you don't know. Characterizing the science you don't know as "art" is a fools game.
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It all depends on if you are using 3rd party indicators (some might not be so well coded or be demanding) and if you have tons of charts... I found personally that NT works better (much more responsive and quicker loading - and better at handling disconnections) with futures data than with fxcm forex data. But I was using tick charts, maybe it is different on forex for time charts.
NT7 and NT6.5 also had their issues. I would not say that NT7 is more stable than NT8 like a previous poster was saying but I can completely believe that for his setup, whatever that it is, it is. That's the NinjaTrader way... At least in NT8 I'm not having to deal with corrupt databases constantly the way I was in older versions (can't remember exactly which older version I was using at the time)
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I'm responding mainly to your feeling of being overwhelmed with the available choices.... I sympathize, but would like to tell you that you may be giving yourself more grief than you need to, which I hope will come as a relief.
I think you would do quite well with either NinjaTrader or SierraChart. As to which one to choose, there have already been some good posts on the subject. Here is my take on the pros and cons:
- Ninja is only available now with a few brokers, because NT has gone into the brokerage business themselves and this has limited the brokers they do business with.
- Ninja is going through growing pains as it rolls out (and finishes) its current release, NT8, which is a complete rewrite. There are still some issues, but much less than in the past. Most people are finding it stable and usable.
- SierraChart is solid and generally faster than NT (although it does take a longer time, usually, to load charts initially in a session -- after that, it is much faster.)
- SierraChart's user interface is complicated, and the online documentation was written by a maniac. Once you get more familiar with the platform and the documentation, it does get easier to understand, and to see its logic. It may take a little time, though.
- SierraChart is much more complete in the sense of having features already incorporated into the product without needing to turn to external sources such as vendors or user programmers. However, there is a huge library of add-ons available, written by user programmers, which extends Ninja's functionality. This is available on FIO (in the download section and in threads to request new indicators) and elsewhere.
On balance, I think that the pluses and minuses of the two are manageable. They do have their differences.... But with all that said, the differences are less than they appear, and either will probably do for most traders.
The best advice would be to take each out for a spin with a demo version from a broker who provides it, and also look into the brokers, since most brokers will not have both (actually, most brokers will not have Ninja. ) Your personal assessment of the platforms -- what you personally like or don't like -- may be much more important than the views of others, myself included.
But don't be overwhelmed. The fact is that either will probably do well for what you need. This does not need to be a terribly difficult decision.
Bob.
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A grumpy maniac with a grudge against society, strung high on caffeine, and kept locked in the basement all by himself with the backup tapes and old computer equipment.
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Anyone who has not used SierraChart may not fully appreciate the absolute accuracy of this comment, so I thought I would provide a simple example -- one of my favorites, actually.
I should point out that what they are ranting about is a policy of CME that requires exorbitant fees for access to data if you don't have a funded trading account with a broker, and I do agree with the substance of their complaint, so it's not like it's totally unfounded.
But it is classic SierraChart. Got to love it.
Bob.
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I actually enjoyed their rant against IG Markets... but their solution to supporting new brokers sucks... basically after that fiasco, they don't want to do any work themselves to support any new brokers, instead they want any new broker to adopt a new "standard" API that SC themselves created. Well that would be nice, wouldn't it.. lol
Just to follow up on this post, although you may have, at first, some difficulty with learning both the program and the organization of the Help file (there's a learning curve for the Help also ), and it is definitely quirky, as you get the hang of it (the platform and the documentatation) you will probably find that, somewhere in all this, there is just about everything that you need, or never knew you would need, or have ever even thought of. It will just take an effort at first.
I think the effort is worth it, but that's a personal decision.
Bob.
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Personally I use and have used all 3, although NT7 and MT4. My absolute favorite is Sierra Charts for sure, but yes it takes sometime to set up and get used to but it does worth the invested time. I still use NT today, for simple price action trading and writing code its pretty good. MT4 for would be the third on my list but it does the job for forex trading and if you ever want to learn to code it is a great place to start because it has a huge user-base and many guides. All 3 have their ups and downs, so the answer depends on you try them out and see for yourself which one matches you the best.
“Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.” Δ
“There is no path, but only a fool wouldn’t follow it.”
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Like said before, Sierra is highly customizable. Every indicator they sell for NT7/8 is free in Sierra (If you use Service Package 5). That said, it takes a lot of time(!) to set things up so be preapeared to dive into manuals an/or video guides if you are completely new. NT has more user-friendly interface, but if you get familiar with Sierra, there isnt much you could not edit.
You will most likely hate the Sierra at first (I did), after you learned the basics and dive into more advanced settings sky is the limit.
Sierra also runs smoother for me than NT (Tested with multiple chart set-ups and DOMS).
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it's as much what it doesn't do.. hog memory or crash.. but like someone said it does take much longer to load data initially (at least ticks. not sure about time data maybe that is not slow?) - but this is only the first time you use a symbol
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I'm surprised that MultiCharts isn't getting more love. I started using it six years ago based on a video review that Big Mike did comparing MC and NT and haven't looked back.
I can't speak highly enough about MC. It's generally rock-solid. I turn on my algorithmic trading system before bed and it trades for me automatically overnight and during the US day session. I had some missteps initially (generally from my own mistakes and inexperience), but for the past several years I've been able to trust it 100%. I'm able to sleep quite well with it trading in the background.
My only basis for comparison is TradeStation, which I used for a short time. They're quite similar. The major difference is philosophical: TS is a "complete package" that includes the TS data feed and a TS brokerage account. MultiCharts is more "roll your own" -- you have to supply your own data feed and your own broker. (I use IQFeed and Interactive Brokers.) You can also use MC to download free end-of-day data from Google, Yahoo, etc. To me, the MC software seems more polished overall than TradeStation. (I believe the developers used to work for TradeStation, but then split off.)
You can either use the built-in MC indicators and signals, or you can write your own using its scripting language. There are two flavors of MultiCharts, the EasyLanguage version (the same language that TradeStation uses) and a newer version that uses C#. Other than the scripting differences, they're the same.
EasyLanguage itself is a rather simple, basic language derived from Pascal. However, it has lots of syntactic sugar that makes the scripts quite simple to write and shorter than the equivalent code in C#. I've never had a trading idea that was "too complicated" to code using EasyLanguage. You probably wouldn't use EasyLanguage if you're a quant doing HFT on Wall Street, but for casual traders, it's perfect.
MultiChart also has one killer feature for me: Portfolio trading. You can define a basket of dozens or hundreds of symbols (stocks, futures, etc.) and then apply an automated trading strategy to the portfolio as a whole. TS has portfolio backtesting, but not portfolio trading, to my knowledge.
Like any software, it has bugs. However, the developers maintain a public bug-tracking system and they're very aggressive about squashing bugs. The platform is now on Version 11 (with Version 12 in beta) and it's quite mature.
Finally, the MC support team is amazing. They're friendly and super-responsive about fixing bugs quickly. They also have an active community where you can get help in the forums.
Note that my professional bias is towards automated trading. However, it also seems to be quite capable for manual chart-based trading.
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Sorry, but I've never actually used that feature. However, it seems like a great tool for discretionary traders. You can practice your trading using historical data before you start trading "for real."
I'm strictly an algorithmic trader -- I program a script, backtest that script against historical data to see how it performs, iterate with modifications to the script, and then (possibly) set up that script for live algorithmic trading.
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I received a question from someone asking for good "introduction to EasyLanguage" tutorials. I'll post my response below for everyone:
---
There are two dialects of EasyLanguage -- the original version from TradeStation and an updated version from MultiCharts. The MultiCharts implementation is backwards-compatible with the original language, but adds some keywords for MutliCharts-specific features (like the portfolio trading features). Any materials that discuss the TradeStation dialect will generally be applicable to MultiCharts.
The starting place are some reference manuals from TradeStation. The free books below are quite good.
Go With sierra. Its tough to set up and very robust so you wont get the hang of it the first day, but ts so worth it in the long run. Ive used TOS, CTS. CQG and TT. Sierra kills them all and its very inexpensive. I was just paying 500 per month with CTS and it has tons of bugs that cost me over 2k this month. Now im using Sierra for 35 bucks and not 1 problem.. I love these Guys !!
I'm going to revive this thread since I have been muddling about with the same question. I've been trading options and futures for around 5-6 years and have used ThinkorSwim and Tradestation. Primarily I use ThinkorSwim but am now as well looking for a new platform.
In all this discussion, unless I missed it, no one has addressed the what the original poster is trading. It sounds like they have been trading options on TOS and are looking to trade futures.
Please correct me if I'm wrong on this one, but Sierra Charts really lacks any functionality when it comes to trading options. There are no real time options tables and any options table there is you have to create manually (at least this is what SC support has told me). I've really wanted to use SC but without dynamic options tables (that you don't create manually) I'm not sure how one uses SC to trade if they trade options as part of their trading ethos.
wish I would have seen this post before spending 3 grand on a ninjatrader lifetime license and 3rd party addons, sierra charts is so much better, ninja crashes and freezes all the time and sucks
Was this with NT7 or NT8? Were you using a lot of indicators?
I use NT7 and it crashes about once a year on schedule but it's always been when I put some dang new indicator on it when I trade price action only without indicators in the first place.
In other words, it's always my fault for screwing around with new indicators when I don't need them in the first place. (I get bored sometimes and like to look at other things).
I've looked at Sierra Chart but it seems like it would take me a long time to set it up so I always give up on it.
was using NT8, I tried having 10 charts running with lots of order flow indicators and a few 3rd party addons but it would inevitably freeze up or crash within a few hours, got it down to having just 2 ES and nyse tick charts with about 5-7 indicators and it would only crash maybe once every 3 days, thought this was normal considering tradestation and thinkorswim suck too, last straw though was friday sitting there trying to trade and it goes and crashes (I mean completely closes) again right before a key reversal point I had been anticipating so I have been researching sierra charts since and man I regret my ninja trader purchases. sierra is so much leaner and faster. read post from big mike saying he can have 70 charts with sierra running, I wouldn’t even dare try half that with ninja.
btw I am using a maxed out 2019 macbook pro 16” running parallels so my computer performance is not an issue
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I’m glad I ran across this topic today, as I was about to pull the trigger and buy NT8 for trading stocks through TD Ameritrade and then eventually move to Futures through a NT broker.
I run a 10900K CPU and 32GB of 3600 RAM and can do about 1 Million calculations in NT8 in a couple hours, so far it has been rock steady for me. This is obviously with the free version!
I basically took most of 2019 off from trading, due to life situations, and was looking at getting back into trading stocks at first, then futures.
In 2017, I dumped Fidelity
In 2019, I dumped TOS. But, I like TD as a broker and buy bonds through them.
In 2020 I dumped TradeStation, I was not a fan of the user interface at all.
I really like the user interface on NT8, it’s super clean and I’m learning C# in hopes of automating, or getting it as close to automated as possible, my trading.
With NT8, is there a big difference between the Free version and the the life license? Are there more indicators in the license one?
all the orderflow stuff is in the lifetime version.
Free version connecting to Live accounts is basically crippleware.. There are a lot of features available in the free version when connected to demo accounts that are not available live unless you lease it. Tabs.. Chart Trading... ATM strategies... I think the ability to code. Not sure if you can run strategies or not.
Performance in ninjatrader is not really linked to machine specifications like cpu and RAM (as long as they are good enough). If only....
Performance issues can plague even highly specced machines but apparently a lot of people don't encounter these issues.. but when you do, it is not fun. It is most likely to occur during periods of very high volatility. Ninjatrader usually always runs fine when the market is quiet.
I would consider also MotiveWave. It's quite recent and works very well. I use Sierrachart and MotiveWave.
All plataforms have pros and cons, Sierrachart is great for customization you can basically do whatever you want. However the learning curve is quite steep.
much less steep with ticinotrader chartbooks (cost a few $ total but worth it) (because then you don't have to configure footprints, tpo, market depth history, vp) yourself - which normally takes a long time to learn because of the myriad of options
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Disclosure: This communication is sent to you by NinjaTrader, LLC, a software development company which owns and supports all proprietary technology relating to and including the NinjaTrader trading platform.
Like others who have replied, I use Ninja but don’t like it. I use it because indicators I like are optimized for it.. I have used Sierra; it has a longer learning curve, but is more stable. Ninja freezes often, especially when the market is moving quickly - just last week one chart froze two days in a row while my other charts were fine. But the only way to correct the frozen chart was to reboot all of Ninja. So annoying. As for trading platforms, Infinity Futures is a futures-only platform that is very stable, fast, light, has has very competitive commissions. Slippage is rare, especially compared to Ninja, and you can get Sierra Charts through them for a reasonable cost.
They're all good platforms for different reasons. Whatever suits your needs in regards to broker and platform. If you go with AMP than you've already eliminated one platform and Meta supports the indicators you're looking to use...
At least in NT8 I'm not having to deal with corrupt databases constantly the way I was in older versions (can't remember exactly which older version I was using at the time)
) Your personal assessment of the platforms -- what you personally like or don't like -- may be much more important than the views of others, myself included.
