Demo to live: a checklist before attaching an EA to real money

[FXS London Scalper]

EAs moved from demo to live very often do worse at first. A checklist catches the usual reasons before money is at stake.

• Same broker and the same account type on demo and live? Demo servers can have different spreads and execution.
• Same symbol names, digits and contract sizes? Suffixes like .r or .pro break symbol checks.
• Commission included in the backtest and demo? Some demo accounts charge none.
• Stop level and freeze level identical? Read them from the live specification.
• Lot size calculated from live balance and the live account's minimum step?
• Magic number unique, so the EA doesn't touch manual trades or other EAs?
• Behaviour after a restart: does it recognise open positions?

Then run live at minimum size for a few weeks and compare each live trade with the demo trade at the same moment. Differences in fills and timing will show up quickly.

A worked example: a strategy making 0.3 pips per trade on demo with no commission becomes negative with $7 round-turn commission (0.7 pips). The checklist catches that before the first live trade.

What's on your checklist?