Trailing Drawdown vs Static Drawdown at a Prop Firm
Trailing vs static drawdown read off one UK-facing firm that sells both: Alpha One's moving floor against Alpha Pro's fixed one, worked on $100,000.
Trailing drawdown vs static drawdown at a prop firm comes down to where the loss floor sits. A static floor is fixed below the starting balance and never moves. A trailing floor follows the account’s highest point, so profits lift it. At Alpha Capital Group, Alpha Pro is static from the starting balance and Alpha One trails the high-water mark.
This is an evergreen explainer. The mechanism does not date; the figures below are what Alpha Capital Group’s own pages said when this desk read them on 3 October 2026, and a firm can rewrite its rulebook whenever it chooses. The reason to use one firm rather than invented round numbers is that this firm sells both models side by side, so the difference can be read off its own published terms rather than imagined.
What is the difference between static and trailing drawdown?
A static drawdown is a fixed floor set below the starting balance; it does not move however far the account grows. A trailing drawdown is measured from the highest point the account has reached, so the floor rises behind every new peak. Alpha Capital Group sells both: Alpha Pro is static from the starting balance, and Alpha One trails the high-water mark.
Both are versions of the same rule, the maximum drawdown, also called max loss: the total fall the account may take before it is closed. It sits beside the daily loss limit, which caps one trading day and resets, and which this site’s daily loss limit explainer reads plan by plan. The maximum drawdown does not reset. What separates the two models is only the reference point the floor is measured from: the starting balance, or the best balance so far.
Trailing drawdown vs static drawdown at one prop firm
The firm’s Alpha One product page and Alpha Pro product page were both read at 200 on 3 October 2026. Every figure in this table is from those two pages.
| Plan | Phases | Profit target | Max loss | Daily loss |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alpha One 6% plan | 1 | 6% | 4% trailing, high-water mark | 3% evaluation, 4% Qualified |
| Alpha One 10% plan | 1 | 10% | 6% trailing, high-water mark | 4% |
| Alpha One 12% plan | 1 | 12% | 8% trailing, high-water mark | 5% |
| Alpha Pro 6% | 2 | 6%, then 6% | 6% static, from starting balance | 3% |
| Alpha Pro 8% | 2 | 8%, then 5% | 8% static, from starting balance | 4% |
| Alpha Pro 10% | 2 | 10%, then 5% | 10% static, from starting balance | 5% |
The Alpha Pro page puts it in one line: Pro uses static max drawdown, not trailing. The Alpha One page describes its max loss as trailing, based on the high-water mark. The Alpha One page also says Alpha Swing, the firm’s other two-step programme, uses static drawdown.
The firm’s pages do not all say the same thing. Its 2026 rules-explained post, published 20 May 2026 and read at 200 on 3 October 2026, lists a single Alpha One with a 10% target, a 6% trailing drawdown and a 4% daily loss, the same figures the live page now gives for its 10% plan. It lists the Pro 10% Phase 2 target as “see help centre”; the live product page gives 5%. Where the two disagree, this post uses the live product page for current terms and names the May post by date.
How does a trailing drawdown work on a prop firm account?
The floor starts the same distance below the starting balance as a static one would. The difference appears once the account makes money. Each new high-water mark drags the floor up behind it, so the gap between the best balance and the floor stays the same while the gap between the starting balance and the floor shrinks.
The May rules post works this through for its 6% trailing Alpha One on $100,000. The floor starts at $94,000. As the balance climbs, the floor trails up by the same $6,000, so at $102,000 it sits at $96,000. It keeps trailing only until the balance reaches $106,000. At that point, in the post’s words, the floor locks at the initial balance and never moves again.
The table below sets that ladder beside the three static Pro floors. The Alpha One column is the firm’s own example; the static columns are this desk’s arithmetic on the published percentages, since a floor fixed from the starting balance is the same at every balance.
| Balance reached | Alpha One, 6% trailing (May post) | Pro 6% static | Pro 8% static | Pro 10% static |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $100,000 (start) | $94,000 | $94,000 | $92,000 | $90,000 |
| $102,000 | $96,000 | $94,000 | $92,000 | $90,000 |
| $106,000 | $100,000, locked | $94,000 | $92,000 | $90,000 |
| $110,000 | $100,000, locked | $94,000 | $92,000 | $90,000 |
Read across the $106,000 row. The trailing trader is $6,000 above the floor; the Pro 6% trader is $12,000 above it. The firm’s separate explainer on the two models, published 9 May 2026, updated 28 May 2026 and read at 200 on 3 October, makes the same point on a 10% static plan: the loss limit stays at $90,000 even when the balance reaches $110,000.
Does trailing drawdown stop trailing?
On some plans it does. Alpha Capital Group’s 20 May 2026 rules post says the 6% trailing floor on a $100,000 Alpha One account follows the balance until the account reaches $106,000, then locks at the $100,000 starting balance and never moves again. Whether a lock applies, and where, is a term of each plan; this desk found it stated for that one plan only.
That limit matters. The live Alpha One page offers 4% and 8% trailing variants as well, and the text this desk read from that page on 3 October describes the trailing max loss without describing a lock. Arithmetic would put the 4% plan’s starting floor at $96,000 and the 8% plan’s at $92,000 on $100,000. Where either stops trailing, if it does, is not something any page read for this post states, so this post does not say.
A lock at the starting balance changes the shape of the risk. Before it, every gain also raises the line the account must not cross. After it, the account behaves like a static plan with the floor at breakeven: the trader can no longer lose the firm’s starting balance, but can lose every dollar of profit above it.
Is trailing drawdown better than static drawdown?
Neither is better in the abstract; they are different contracts. A static floor leaves more room as profits build. A trailing floor tightens until it stops, and at Alpha Capital Group the trailing plan is a one-phase evaluation while the static plans have two phases. Read the exact numbers for the plan being bought, not the label on it. This is a description of the rules, not advice on which to pay for.
The trade the firm offers is visible in its own table. Alpha One asks for one phase, with a one-day minimum in the May rules post; Alpha Pro asks for two phases, each with at least three trading days, and in exchange its floor never rises. The firm’s explainer frames trailing as suiting some styles and static others. That is the firm’s framing, and this desk does not adopt it.
The interaction with the daily limit is the other half. A floor that has trailed up close to the balance can be closer than the day’s allowance, so on a trailing plan the maximum drawdown can become the rule that bites first. When it does, the outcome is the one this site’s hard breach explainer describes: the account closes and the fee goes with it.
What are the three types of trailing drawdown?
The three usually named are end-of-day trailing, where the high-water mark updates only at the close; intraday trailing, where it moves with open profit during the session; and trailing that locks once the floor reaches a set level, often the starting balance. The pages this desk read for Alpha One state the high-water mark but not whether it updates intraday or at the close.
That gap is worth naming plainly. Alpha One’s product page does say how its daily loss is measured, from the higher of end-of-day balance or equity, and the Pro page says Pro 6% uses the highest end-of-day balance or equity while Pro 8% and Pro 10% are balance-based. Neither page, as read, says whether the trailing high-water mark counts open profit. Anyone buying Alpha One should get that answer from the firm in writing before relying on it.
What this desk read, and what it did not
Read at 200 on 3 October 2026: the Alpha One and Alpha Pro product pages, the 20 May 2026 rules post, and the firm’s trailing-vs-static explainer. The rules post also records that Alpha Three is not offered for new purchases, and tells readers to confirm live rules before trading. This site’s Alpha Capital Group review covers the firm’s wider terms. No other firm’s drawdown rules were read for this post, and nothing here describes how any other firm sets its floor.
The risk line
Alpha Capital Group’s pages say its evaluations run on simulated funds and that performance fees are not guaranteed. No regulator’s page was read for this post, and nothing here says the firm is authorised or regulated anywhere. What a drawdown breach costs is the evaluation fee; a floor that moves is a reason to do the arithmetic before paying it, not a figure to trade towards.