In trading on MT4, there will be times when traders will encounter situations where MT4 has technical problems, slowdowns and delays, affecting the speed of order execution and directly affecting your profits. So what are the causes of such a situation and what are the solutions? Let’s find out in the article below.
In addition to slow network issues, here are some common causes of MT4 delays:
- Trade on too many MT4 accounts (to test many different brokers…)
- Using too many indicators on the same chart
- Trading at a low time interval like M1 also requires network speed.
To overcome this situation, the way to accelerate MT4 consists of 2 parts: increase the speed of the network and increase the processing speed of MT4. In this article, we will introduce how to improve the processing speed of MT4 or, in other words, reduce the data to be processed so that MT4 runs faster and smoothly.
Method 1: Reduce the maximum bars in the history
Go to Tools > Options (or press Ctrl + O) > Charts. Then enter the parameters in the two boxes “Maximum bars in history” and “Maximum bars in the chart” at 10000.
- “Maximum bars in history” is the maximum number of candles in memory that MT4 will store
- “Maximum bars in the chart” is the maximum number of candles that appear on your chart.
In short, the lower these parameters, the lower the MT4 data stored and the smoother the operation of MT4 will be.
The disadvantage of this way is that it makes it difficult for traders to backtest the old chart, so I left it at 10000, which makes it convenient to review the chart from time to time.
Method 2: Turn off unnecessary indicators
Too many indicators mean that MT4 will have to process more information, so MT4’s performance will become slow. The more you use of them, the slower MT4 will be, so you need to carefully consider the essential indicators and backtest to have an effective and clean method. Therefore, limiting the use of many indicators at once will help increase the processing speed of MT5.
Method 3: Disable News on the Server tab
- Activate the Options tab by pressing CTRL + O or by clicking Tools – > Options.
- Uncheck the “Enable news” box because this feature is often used for MT4 to update information directly from the broker or add-ons of the company that makes the MT4 software (ebook, EA…). If traders don’t need this feature, turning off this notification will also help MT4 run faster.
Method 4: Turn Off Email, Notifications, Events Tab
These features are mainly unnecessary for traders, so turning them off will minimize mt4 lag.
- Deactivate email
- Turn off notifications to make MT4 faster
- Turn off events
Disabling this feature will stop all mt4 sounds, familiar sounds like when placing orders, dragging and dropping stop loss/take profit bars, MT4 reconnecting to the internet… will no longer appear, depending on your preferences each trader. In particular, in an environment with frequent cable interruptions such as in Vietnam, the interruption of the Internet – continuous reconnection combined with the sound of MT4 will cause a lot of inconvenience to traders.