Prop Firm Payout Rules: First Windows, Caps and Split Ladders

4 active trading days is the median of each firm's shortest first payout window across the 29 firms in our dataset that state one, as of 5 November 2026. 7 of the 36 firms with structured programme data state no window in structured form. As of 13 September 2026, 14 days was the most common value, at 6 firms. Between the window and the money sit the split, the cap and the minimum.

The first payout window

The window counts active trading days from funding, not calendar days, so a 14-day window can run three weeks or more. TradeDay states 1 day. FundedNext and Topstep state 3. Apex, Lucid Trading and FXIFY state 5. Hola Prime, BrightFunded and City Traders Imperium state 7. Bulenox and IQ Capital state 10. Alpha Capital, The5ers, DNA Funded, Fintokei, FTMO and Moneta Funded state 14. On 20 July 2026 FXIFY dropped its per-cycle cap and its consistency gate and set its first payout at 5 days ^[6], while Fintokei overhauled its payout terms to 14-day cycles with stricter consistency enforcement ^[7].

Split ladders and what "up to 100 percent" means

80 percent is the floor at most firms in our dataset and the median floor. Two firms sit below it: Maven Trading at 70 percent and TradeDay at 50 percent, rising to 90. 15 of 36 firms advertise up to 100 percent on at least one programme as of 5 November 2026. As of 13 September 2026 the seven that did were Apex at 100 flat, Bulenox 90 to 100, City Traders Imperium 100, Funded Trading Plus 80 to 100, Goat Funded 90 to 100, Moneta Funded 88 to 100 and The5ers 80 to 100. FundingPips pays 95 flat, FundedNext 80 to 95, FTMO 90 flat and E8 Markets 80 flat.

"Up to" is a ladder. On a $5,000 payout, 80 percent is $4,000 and 100 percent is $5,000; the $1,000 difference exists only if you meet the condition for the top rung. Funded Trading Plus shows how a rung can move: since 6 September 2026 its 90 percent tier is a paid add-on ^[3]. Apex, City Traders Imperium, FundingPips, FTMO and E8 Markets state a flat figure with no ladder at all.

Caps per request and per cycle

$12,000 per cycle and $250,000 per account is Topstep's cap. Maven allows $10,000 per 30-day cycle and voids the excess ^[5]. IQ Capital allows 3,000 USDT per request below $200K and 5,000 USDT at $200K, up to 50 percent of profits, and states this on its rules page rather than at checkout ^[4]. Blue Guardian Futures Standard caps the first payout at $3,000 and later payouts at $3,500 at $100K. Bulenox caps the first three payouts by account size and lifts the cap after. MFFU pays up to 10 percent of account equity per cycle. Elite Trader Funding caps $3,000 per cycle. Tradeify's Select Daily path pays up to $600 per day at the smallest size, and its Select Flex path pays 50 percent up to $1,250 ^[2].

The worked case: a $15,000 month at Topstep requests $12,000. The same month at Maven requests $10,000 and the remaining $5,000 is voided under Maven's stated rule. What Topstep does with the $3,000 above its cap is a question for its payout page. At IQ Capital a $10,000 profit on a $100K account requests 3,000 USDT, because the per-request cap binds before the 50 percent share does.

Minimums and methods

$1 is the lowest minimum payout in our dataset, at FundingPips, and $1,000 is the highest, at Bulenox and MFFU. Alpha Capital sets $2, Tradeify $5, FundedNext and Topstep $10. Breakout, FXIFY, Funded Trading Plus, Hola Prime and Maven set $50. DNA Funded, Goat Funded and Moneta Funded set $100, and The5ers $150. A $1,000 minimum on a small account means profit sits exposed to the drawdown for longer before it becomes a request.

Payout methods are not a field in our dataset. IQ Capital states its caps in USDT, which tells you its rails before its FAQ does. Deductions at the first payout are a method question too: Earn2Trade deducts its $139 activation fee from the first withdrawal, and Funded Futures Network charges $126 per month for data once funded.

Scaling plans and live transition

$5,000,000 is the highest advertised scaling ceiling in our dataset, at Funded Trading Plus, and it is a paid add-on ^[3]. City Traders Imperium and Fintokei advertise $4,000,000, Alpha Capital and Goat Funded $2,000,000, and ThinkCapital $1,500,000. The5ers shows a table to $500K and markets $4,000,000. Live capital is a different ladder: Topstep reports 0.71 percent reached Live in 2025 ^[1], and Tradeify reports 3.0 percent of funded accounts called up to Live Funded between August 2025 and July 2026, with its Elite tier opening after 3 approved payouts ^[2]. DayTraders.com states transition is at the firm's discretion and reaches about 1 percent of sim-funded traders, and Elite Trader Funding opens its live tier after $25,000 in cumulative sim payouts; see our research on business-model-types. The funded stage thins out first: 33.3 percent of Topstep's funded participants and 28.5 percent of Tradeify's received a payout at all.

Buffers and reset-after-payout rules

Consistency caps apply at the payout stage, not only in the evaluation. 29 of 36 firms record a best-day cap on at least one programme as of 5 November 2026. As of 13 September 2026, 50 percent was the most common threshold at 6 firms, and Topstep applied a 50 percent consistency target alongside its $3,000 max loss at $100K. Whether the cap resets after each payout, and whether the firm counts profit from the funding date or from the last request, is set in prose on the payout page. Fintokei's move to 14-day cycles with stricter consistency enforcement on 20 July 2026 shows that enforcement can tighten without the percentage changing ^[7]. Bulenox's size-linked cap on its first three payouts and Blue Guardian's $3,000 then $3,500 structure are the two step-up rules our dataset records. Where a firm requires a profit buffer above the starting balance before a first request, that requirement is prose, and our dataset does not hold it as a field.

Read the payout page, not the banner

$1.5 billion plus paid to traders all-time and a 99.26 percent payout approval rate are Topstep's marketing figures ^[1]. $650 million plus paid in rewards since 2015 is FTMO's. Neither total comes with a count of requests, and no firm in our dataset publishes a denial rate. IQ Capital's per-request cap is stated on its rules page and not at checkout. Funded Trading Plus's 90 percent tier became a paid add-on in a changelog entry, not a banner. 5 of the 47 verified changes in our ledger between 20 July and 6 September 2026 were payout changes. Read the payout page before you buy, and read /changes before you request.

What this means for you

The window is the easy number: 17 firms state one, from 1 day at TradeDay to 14 days at six firms. The cap and the ladder condition change what a good month is worth, and they sit on the rules page, not the pricing page.

Convert "up to" into a floor before you compare. A firm advertising up to 100 percent with an 80 percent floor pays you 80 percent until you meet a condition it sets, and that condition can become a paid add-on, as it did at Funded Trading Plus on 6 September 2026.

Run the cap against your own numbers. A $15,000 month is $12,000 at Topstep, $10,000 at Maven with $5,000 voided, and 3,000 USDT at IQ Capital. The headline split tells you none of that; the cap does.

Data note

Figures marked "our dataset" come from the PropTraderCheck structured dataset, and each carries its own date. Figures as of 13 September 2026 come from that snapshot: 30 firms with structured programme data (of 37 tracked), 159 programme rows, 48 programmes. Figures as of 5 November 2026 come from that snapshot: 36 firms with structured programme data, 916 programme rows. Regulatory positions are stated as of the date given and change.