Drawdown calculator

How this is calculated

No hidden model and nothing fitted to data. Every figure on this page comes out of these lines, applied to the numbers you typed.

gain to recover  = ( 1 ÷ ( 1 − drawdown ) ) − 1
streak, compound = equity × ( 1 − risk% ) ^ losses
streak, fixed    = equity − ( losses × equity × risk% )
run of n losses  = ( 1 − win rate ) ^ n
── from a pasted curve ───────────────────────
drawdown at i    = ( running peak − equity ) ÷ running peak
max drawdown     = worst such value over the series
recovery factor  = net profit ÷ worst peak-to-trough loss

The other three

Frequently asked questions

How do I calculate the gain needed to recover from a drawdown?

Divide one by one minus the decline as a fraction, then subtract one. A 20% decline needs 25% to recover, 33% needs 50%, 50% needs 100% and 75% needs 300%. The asymmetry exists because the gain is calculated on the reduced balance, which is smaller than the balance the loss was taken from.

What is maximum drawdown?

The largest peak-to-trough decline in an equity curve, measured as a percentage of the peak it fell from. Measuring against the running peak rather than the starting balance is what makes it meaningful for an account that grows: a curve that doubles and then halves has suffered a 50% drawdown even though it ends where it began.

Can I analyse my own trading results?

Yes — paste a column of balances or a list of per-trade profits and losses, and the tool reports maximum drawdown in percent and currency, when the decline started and bottomed, how long it stayed underwater, whether it recovered, and the recovery factor. It reads a spreadsheet column directly and understands parenthesised amounts as negatives, which is how accounting exports write losses.

Is my equity curve uploaded anywhere?

No. The parsing and the analysis both run in your browser as JavaScript on this page — your series is never transmitted, never stored and never logged, and closing the tab is all it takes to discard it. A free account unlocks the calculator; it does not send anyone your numbers.

What is recovery factor?

Net profit over the series divided by the worst peak-to-trough loss within it. It expresses how much was made per unit of the deepest decline endured to make it. Like every figure here it describes a record that already exists and implies nothing about a future one.

What does the losing streak probability column mean?

It is the chance that one specific run of n trades comes out as losses throughout, calculated as your loss rate raised to the power n. It is deliberately not the chance of hitting such a streak somewhere within a long sequence of trades, which is substantially higher — over hundreds of trades, runs that look unlikely in isolation become ordinary.