Last verified fees: July 13, 2026. Every comparison site lists the sticker price of a prop firm challenge. Almost none of them compute what it actually costs to get funded — because that depends on resets, activation fees, subscription months, refund policies, and above all your realistic pass rate. This calculator does the math the sticker price hides.
Fees verified against official pages July 13, 2026 (see firm profiles for sources). Pass rate is your assumption — firms rarely publish real pass rates. Expected attempts = 1/p (geometric); the 90% budget is the number of attempts needed for a 90% chance of at least one pass. FTMO prices in EUR; others USD. Coupon pricing (Apex runs near-constant 80–90% codes) not included — apply it mentally to the Apex rows.
How to read this honestly
The single most important input is the pass rate, and it is the one number no firm advertises. Regulatory filings and the few disclosed figures in the industry suggest most traders pass far less often than they think — if you have never passed an evaluation, 10–25% per attempt is a more honest starting assumption than 50%. Notice what the math does: at low pass rates, FTMO\u2019s refundable 2-step fee becomes surprisingly competitive (you only ever pay for failures), Apex\u2019s cheap coupon evals stay cheap but the payout ceiling caps the upside, and Topstep\u2019s subscription quietly compounds with every month you don\u2019t pass.
Fee sources: Apex profile · FTMO profile · Topstep profile — each links to the firm\u2019s official documentation. Found a stale number? It will be corrected in our next weekly verification sweep.