What Does It Actually Cost to Get a Funded Futures Account?

The number a prop firm shows on its homepage is rarely the whole story. Some accounts bill once. Some bill monthly until you pass or cancel. Some charge extra to activate. A few charge extra just to use a different data feed.

None of that is hidden, but it is scattered across a pricing page, a checkout screen and a terms document, which is exactly how a trader ends up surprised.

This guide puts every real number in one place: what an evaluation costs to start, what it costs if you fail and reset, and what, if anything, gets added at checkout. The figures below are current for Phoenix Trader Funding as of its Phoenix 3.0 release.

What actually decides the price

Three things set the price of a funded futures account: the account family, the account size, and, for one family, the data feed.

Classic and Daily accounts bill monthly, the way a subscription does, until you pass the evaluation or cancel. Spark and Merit are paid once and never bill again. That distinction matters more than the sticker price, because it changes what "cost" even means for that account, and it is covered in full further down.

The full price list

These are the list prices Phoenix Trader Funding charges before any discount, plus what each account currently costs with its launch code applied. A discount code is always time-limited, so confirm the exact terms at checkout before you rely on a figure below.

Classic is the one family priced per data feed, and dxFeed is always $20 more than TFeed at every size: a Classic Starter is $89 a month on TFeed or $109 on dxFeed, before any discount.

TFeed is Phoenix's own execution feed and carries no market data of its own; dxFeed bundles Level 1 market data in, which is the $20 you are paying for. Daily accounts exist only on TFeed, so a Daily price never needs a feed qualifier.

One time or monthly: what you are actually buying

Spark and Merit are paid once. There is no renewal, no recurring charge, and nothing bills again after the initial fee. Classic and Daily bill monthly, the same way a subscription does, and that subscription keeps renewing every 30 days until you either pass the evaluation or cancel.

A trader who fails a monthly challenge and does nothing will be charged again at the next renewal.

Most traders never pay a second month either way. A challenge is usually decided, passed or failed, well inside a single 30-day cycle.

But if you are choosing between a one-time Spark and a monthly Classic, the honest comparison is the entry price against how many billing cycles you actually expect to need, not just the number on the page.

The cost most people forget: activation and reset fees

Two costs sit outside the headline price. The activation fee is a one-time charge added when you pass a challenge and open the funded account; the reset fee is what it costs to restart a failed challenge instead of buying a new one from scratch.

Spark is the only family with an activation fee: $29, one time, charged once you pass. Classic, Daily and Merit have no activation fee at all. If a challenge fails and you want another attempt, most accounts offer a reset instead of a full-price restart:

Merit works differently: it is a single attempt, once, ever, with no reset at any price. A trader who does not get funded on a Merit account instead receives Phoenix's Performance Review, a personal report on the attempt, plus tiered consolation rewards.

If restart flexibility matters to you more than a one-shot format, weigh that before choosing Merit over a resettable account.

What else can add to the bill

Two more charges exist outside the challenge itself, and both are optional add-ons rather than anything hidden at checkout.

• Level 1 market data is included free on every account type, on both feeds.
• Level 2 order-book depth is optional: $15 a month per exchange, or $40 a month for a bundle covering four exchanges.
• No monthly fee applies to a funded account beyond what is listed above.

The current launch discount, and when it stops

Phoenix Trader Funding's Phoenix 3.0 launch offer is live on all three billed families, and every discounted price in the table above already reflects it.

The launch offer closes 18 August, 23:59 CEST. After that date every account in this guide returns to its list price and none of the three codes is guaranteed to still work. Check the live checkout for the current price before you buy if you are reading this after that date.

Is a cheap entry price worth it

A low entry fee is real and it is not a trick, but it does not change what the evaluation asks of you. The rules that decide whether you pass, the drawdown limit, the profit target, the minimum trading days, are the same whether you paid $35.20 or $269 for the attempt.

• New to prop trading, or testing a strategy you have not risked money on: start on the lowest-cost account that offers the size you want.
• Confident in a strategy with a real track record: the entry price matters less than picking the account size and payout structure that fits how you already trade.

Where the price genuinely matters is in how many attempts you can afford. Move up in size once the strategy is proven, rather than committing to the largest account on the first try.

A cheap challenge on a strategy that is not ready fails just as fast as an expensive one. It is a cheap way to find that out, not an expensive one.Phoenix Trader Funding