ts geographical dispersion, trillion-dollar daily trading volume, and round-the-clock movement throughout the week positions the Forex market on most traders’ watchlists.

The Forex market’s sheer size and continuous order flow, however, can make it difficult to stay informed through a single monitor.

Multiple monitors provide a greater workspace, particularly convenient if you operate with different technical indicators requiring split windows.

Regardless of whether you trade a live or demo account, those considering switching to a multi-screen setup with MetaQuotes’ MetaTrader 5 (MT5) trading platform, the following guide is a must-read.

 

MT5 on Multiple Monitors

With MetaTrader 4 (MT4), detaching charts or other screen objects is not possible, at least not natively. Fortunately, MT5 includes native support, giving you the freedom to detach charts from the trading terminal window.

The layout of your screens will largely be determined on your trading strategy (trading system). In general, though, you want to be able to view all trading operations, including current price charts (bid price/ask price), applied graphical objects, news, and alarms.

To undock charts on the MT5 platform, you simply right-click the symbol of choice and select Docked. This will release the chart, enabling you to move it freely between other monitors (Figure A).

 

 

(Figure A)

MT5 also comes with a handy feature called ‘chart within a chart’. This is useful for creating a compact chart that overlays another open chart, making it possible to observe two timeframes of the same asset on one chart. This can be beneficial for scalpers and day traders.

Creating a chart within a chart:

• Open a chart and click Insert on the menu bar.

• Hover over the menu option Objects, then hover over Graphical and click on Chart (figure 1.A).

 

 

(Figure 1.A)

• At this point, you’re free to select the location of the recently added chart (figure 1.B). You can position the chart by clicking the upper left-hand corner of the window and dragging it to the desired site.

 

(Figure 1.B)

• To change the timeframe or currency pair of the additional chart, right-click the chart and choose Properties of H1 Chart (in the case of this demonstration – figure 1.C). From here, select the Parameters tab which allows you to specify the desired financial instrument (Symbol) and timeframe (Period), as in figure 1.D. Therefore, (figure 1.C/D), you effectively have the freedom to display USD/CHF on one timeframe and an additional USD/CHF chart on another timeframe all on the same chart, or of another currency pair altogether, such as EUR/USD, GBP/USD or AUD/USD.

 

(Figure 1.C)

 

(Figure 1.D)

 

Multi-Monitor Setup on a Forex VPS

For any version of Windows 7 Ultimate, Windows 7 Enterprise, or Windows 10, you can instruct Remote Desktop Connection to use all monitors.

• Launch Remote Desktop Connection like you normally would when connecting to the VPS. If you have a shortcut containing your connection information that you double-click, you will need to find the actual Remote Desktop Connect program and launch it. You can then create a new shortcut from there after you have configured the settings.

• Click the Display tab (figure 1.E).

 

 

(Figure 1.E)

• Under the display configuration, a checkbox with the text ‘Use all my monitors for the remote session’ is visible. Clicking this checkbox will notify your VPS to use all monitors.

• If you want a shortcut to your VPS with the updated settings, this can be achieved by clicking on the General tab and using the Save or Save as functions.

Using multiple monitors on MetaTrader 5 in a remote desktop session is much like doing so on your own personal computer. You will be able to unpin charts and transfer them to different monitors, allowing you to keep track of different assets and timeframes with ease.

Final Words

Multiple monitors improve your ability to maintain real-time monitoring of open positions, observe the different order types in use (Buy Stop, Sell Stop, Buy Limit, Sell Limit, Stop-Loss, Take-Profit, for example) as well as all financial markets and timeframes followed.

If you do a lot of scripting with MQL5 programming language, the MT5 equivalent of MQL4, multi-screen traders may desire a separate window for the MQL5 editor. MQL5 can be used to develop custom indicators (expert advisors – trading robots).

Having a dedicated window for a strategy tester is also an idea for those who regularly backtest trading signals.

MT5 is a flexible, technologically advanced, platform, offering control over the graphical environment and, with FP Markets, comes with a broad range of trading instruments to choose from, including Forex, Indices, Commodities, and Cryptocurrencies.

FP Markets also facilitates access to different mobile devices and operating systems, including Webtrader (browsers supported: Chrome, Firefox, Safari, IE 10+), iOS (system requirements: iPhone iOS 7.0 or later. Compatible with iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch) and Android (system requirements: Android 4.0 or higher. Download from Google Play).