Risk/Reward Calculator
Enter entry, stop and target by price or by pips. Get the R:R ratio, the win rate you need to break even, and the dollar expectancy per trade at your assumed win rate. If the math is negative, the setup is not worth taking.
- Risk/Reward ratio
- 1 : 3.00
- Breakeven win rate
- 25.0%
- Expectancy per trade
- 0.0050 (price units)
Reading the result
Risk/reward ratio is the size of your target relative to your stop. A 1:2 setup means you risk one dollar to make two — your target is twice as far from entry as your stop loss. The higher the ratio, the lower the win rate you need to remain profitable across a sample of trades.
Breakeven win rate is the percentage of trades you must win to net zero. A 1:1 setup needs 50% wins to break even. A 1:2 setup needs 33.3%. A 1:3 setup only needs 25%. Anything below this threshold means your strategy bleeds money over time, no matter how confident any individual trade feels.
Expectancy is the average dollar outcome per trade given your win rate. Positive expectancy means the setup is mathematically profitable. Negative expectancy means it loses money on average — a common pattern with 1:1 ratios and any win rate below 50%, or with revenge-trade R:R below 1:1.
Formulas
Ratio = Reward ÷ Risk
Breakeven win rate = Risk ÷ (Risk + Reward)
Expectancy = (Win rate × Reward) − ((1 − Win rate) × Risk)
Why most retail traders are negative expectancy
Two common mistakes destroy expectancy: cutting winners early (so realised R:R is smaller than the plan) and moving stops further (so realised risk is bigger than the plan). The math only works when you take what you planned. The calculator is a planning tool — execution discipline is the other half.
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Risk warning: CFDs are complex instruments. Capital at risk. For our full testing methodology see how we rate brokers.