Tradeify Trading Hours: When Can You Trade and What's Restricted? (2026)

Research-based analysis: I've gone through every rule document, help center article, and community data point I could find on Tradeify. This breakdown reflects extensive research across their 3.0 overhaul — covering Select, Growth, and Lightning plans, the new Elite Live Performance Reward Pool, and updated drawdown mechanics. Nothing here is based on assumptions or marketing copy.

I broke it all down in my complete Tradeify rules overview. For the full picture, read my complete Tradeify review. For the absolute latest, check Tradeify's website or their help center.

Tradeify's trading hours run on the CME Globex schedule: Sunday at 5:00 PM Central Time through Friday at 4:00 PM CT, with a mandatory one-hour maintenance break every day from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM CT. All positions must be closed before that break begins.

I've traded through enough prop firm session windows to know that the hours themselves are rarely the problem. It's the edges that catch people. The 3:58 PM scramble to flatten before maintenance. The random Tuesday when CL closes early for a holiday you forgot about. The overnight ES position that seemed fine at 11 PM but triggered your drawdown by the Asian session open.

Tradeify keeps it clean on this front. They don't add proprietary session restrictions on top of exchange hours. No forced close at 3:00 PM like some firms. No "evaluation-only hours" that shrink your trading window. You get the full CME Globex session, every account type, every phase.

Here's what you need to know to keep your account intact.

When Do Tradeify Markets Open and Close?

As of April 2026: Tradeify follows CME Globex hours across all account families. The trading week starts Sunday at 5:00 PM CT and ends Friday at 4:00 PM CT.

Within that window, each trading day runs 23 hours. Markets open at 5:00 PM CT, trade continuously through the overnight, morning, and afternoon sessions, and close at 4:00 PM CT the following day. Then the one-hour maintenance break kicks in from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM CT.

This schedule applies identically to:

• Select accounts (evaluation and both funded paths)
• Growth accounts (evaluation and funded)
• Lightning accounts (instantly funded, no eval)

No exceptions. No tier-based restrictions. If CME Globex is open, Tradeify lets you trade.

One detail that trips up new traders: the CME "trading day" doesn't match the calendar day. A trading session that starts at 5:00 PM CT on Monday actually belongs to Tuesday's session. Your P&L for "Tuesday" begins accumulating at Monday 5:00 PM. This matters for daily loss limit calculations on Growth accounts. If you're trading the Sunday evening session, that P&L counts toward Monday's daily loss limit.

What Happens During the Daily Maintenance Break?

The daily maintenance break runs from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM CT, Monday through Friday. During this window, no trading is possible. Order routing shuts down. The exchange runs its settlement procedures and resets.

You must be completely flat before 4:00 PM CT. No open positions. No working orders.

If you're still holding a position at 4:00 PM, the platform will attempt a forced liquidation. Depending on your data feed and platform configuration, that forced close could fill at a price you don't love. Slippage during the closing minutes of a session is real, and it's worse when every other trader on Globex is also flattening.

I've seen traders lose $200-$300 on a forced close that should have been a breakeven exit, simply because they waited until 3:59 PM to hit the button. Don't be that person. Set an alarm for 3:50 PM CT. Give yourself a ten-minute buffer.

Does Tradeify Penalize You for Holding Through Maintenance?

Tradeify doesn't issue formal penalties beyond the forced liquidation. You won't get a rule violation or a warning flag on your account for having a position at 4:00 PM. But the forced close itself can create slippage that eats into your P&L or pushes you closer to your drawdown floor.

On Growth accounts with a $600 daily loss limit, that slippage could be the difference between a rough day and a breached account. On Lightning 150K with a $3,000 daily cap, you've got more room, but there's zero reason to test it.

The bottom line on the maintenance break: it's a hard stop. Plan your trading day around it. Not the other way around.

Can You Hold Positions Overnight at Tradeify?

Yes. Tradeify does not restrict overnight holding on most futures contracts. You can enter a position during the afternoon session and carry it through the overnight, Asian, and European sessions without any rule violation.

This is a meaningful difference from several other prop firms. Some firms force you to be flat at the close of the regular session (around 4:00 PM CT) and only allow you to re-enter once the next session opens. Tradeify doesn't do that. As long as you're flat during the 4:00-5:00 PM maintenance window, you can re-enter at 5:00 PM and hold through the night.

What's the Risk of Holding Overnight?

The risk isn't a Tradeify rule. It's the market itself.

Overnight sessions on ES and NQ carry thinner order books. Spreads widen. A tweet from a world leader or an unexpected economic release from Asia or Europe can move prices fast with limited liquidity to absorb it. If you're holding 5 ES contracts through the overnight and an economic headline drops at 2:00 AM, your unrealized loss can balloon before you're even awake.

Your drawdown at Tradeify is EOD trailing, which means it only recalculates at the end of the trading day. But your daily loss limit on Growth accounts is real-time. A $600 swing during the overnight session triggers the daily limit just as fast as one during the regular session.

My approach: I hold overnight selectively, and only on contracts with enough overnight liquidity. ES and NQ are fine. MES and MNQ are fine. CL gets sketchy after 6:00 PM. GC is workable but thinner. I avoid overnight positions on anything below Micro E-mini size, because the bid-ask spread alone can eat your edge.

What Are the Session Times for Each Product?

Tradeify doesn't set its own session schedules per product. It inherits whatever the CME publishes. But the CME doesn't give every product the same hours, and the differences matter if you trade multiple instruments.

All these products technically trade from Sunday 5:00 PM to Friday 4:00 PM CT. The difference is liquidity. ES and NQ maintain reasonable depth through the overnight. CL and GC have pockets of activity aligned with international sessions. NG and RTY get thin fast once the US afternoon session ends.

Tradeify doesn't care which session you trade. But your fills will care. A market order on NQ at 2:00 AM CT might fill 2-3 ticks worse than the same order at 9:35 AM. That slippage hits your P&L and your drawdown just the same.

How Do Trading Hours Affect Your Drawdown?

Tradeify uses end-of-day trailing drawdown. The floor recalculates based on your highest end-of-day balance, not your intraday high-water mark. This means your drawdown floor only moves once per day, after the 4:00 PM CT close.

Here's why that matters for session timing.

Say you open a position at 9:30 AM and it runs $400 in your favor by noon. Your unrealized P&L is +$400. But then the trade reverses in the afternoon session, and you close at 3:55 PM for +$50. Your EOD balance only increased by $50, so your drawdown floor only moves $50.

Compare that to closing the $400 winner at noon and calling it a day. Your EOD balance records +$400 and the floor adjusts accordingly.

The takeaway: Tradeify's EOD model rewards traders who lock in profits before the close rather than holding into the last hour hoping for more. The 4:00 PM snapshot is what counts. Everything between 5:00 PM and 4:00 PM is just the journey.

Does the Daily Loss Limit Reset at the Same Time?

Yes. On Growth accounts with a $600 daily loss limit, the counter resets when the new session opens at 5:00 PM CT. If you lose $500 during Tuesday's session (which started Monday at 5:00 PM CT), you're still alive. But any additional losses before Tuesday's 4:00 PM close push you closer to breach.

Lightning accounts follow the same reset pattern with their $3,000 daily limit.

Select accounts don't have a daily loss limit during evaluation. Select Flex funded has no daily limit either. Select Daily funded carries a $500 daily cap that resets on the same schedule.

Keep track of which session you're in. If you're trading at 6:00 PM CT on a Tuesday evening, that P&L belongs to Wednesday's session. Lose track of this and your daily loss limit math goes sideways.

What Happens on Weekends and Holidays?

Weekends

Tradeify markets are closed from Friday 4:00 PM CT through Sunday 5:00 PM CT. No trading. No order entry. No position management. If you leave a working order active on Friday afternoon and forget to cancel it, it'll sit dead until Sunday evening. Depending on your platform, it might auto-cancel or it might trigger at Sunday's open price if the market gaps through your level.

I cancel all working orders by 3:50 PM CT on Fridays. Always. The Sunday evening gap can be brutal on indices after a weekend of geopolitical noise. The last thing you want is a stale limit order filling into a gap against you.

Holidays

Tradeify follows the CME holiday calendar. The CME publishes its holiday schedule at the start of each year, covering closures and early closes for U.S. holidays like Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Presidents Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.

On early close days, markets typically shut at 12:00 PM CT or 12:15 PM CT instead of 4:00 PM. The maintenance break still applies, so your effective trading window shrinks significantly.

As of April 2026, the upcoming CME holiday dates that affect Tradeify traders:

• Good Friday (April 18, 2026): Markets closed
• Memorial Day (May 25, 2026): Markets closed
• Juneteenth (June 19, 2026): Early close at 12:00 PM CT
• Independence Day (July 3, 2026): Early close at 12:15 PM CT

Tradeify does not send holiday notifications. You won't get an email or dashboard alert telling you tomorrow is an early close. The CME publishes the calendar, and it's on you to check it. Bookmark the CME Group holiday calendar page and review it at the start of each month. I keep a sticky note on my monitor with the next three holiday dates. Low-tech, but it works.

Do Holidays Count as Trading Days?

If the market is fully closed for a holiday, that day doesn't count as a trading day for Tradeify's consistency rule or minimum trading day requirements. You can't log in and generate P&L, so there's nothing to record.

Early close days do count as trading days, but your available window is shorter. If you typically trade the afternoon session, an early close day effectively removes your best hours. Plan around it.

How Do Tradeify's Session Hours Compare to Other Firms?

Most futures prop firms follow CME Globex hours. That's the standard. But where firms diverge is in what they restrict within those hours.

The comparison mostly comes down to overnight holding and session restrictions. Tradeify's approach is straightforward: full Globex access, no phase-based limitations. Some firms restrict overnight positions during evaluation or limit funded accounts to specific session windows. Tradeify doesn't.

Where Tradeify stands out is the zero restrictions across account types. Whether you're in a $99 Growth evaluation or running a $150K Lightning account, your session access is identical. That consistency makes it easier to build one trading routine and carry it across phases without adjusting your schedule.

What's the Best Time to Trade on a Tradeify Account?

This is a strategy question, not a rules question. Tradeify won't penalize you for trading at any time during Globex hours. But not all hours are created equal.

Regular Trading Hours (RTH): 8:30 AM to 3:00 PM CT

This is where volume concentrates on equity index futures. The 9:30 AM ET cash open (8:30 AM CT) brings the heaviest order flow. Spreads are tightest. Price discovery is most efficient. If you're trading ES, NQ, or YM, this is your primary window.

The first 30 minutes after the cash open and the last 30 minutes before the cash close (2:30-3:00 PM CT) tend to produce the most range. I do 80% of my Tradeify trading between 8:30 AM and 11:00 AM CT. That's when the setups are cleanest.

Overnight Session: 5:00 PM to 8:30 AM CT

Lower volume, wider spreads, and more headline-driven movement. The Asian session (roughly 7:00 PM to 2:00 AM CT) and European session (roughly 2:00 AM to 8:30 AM CT) each have their own character. The London open at 2:00 AM CT brings a noticeable volume bump on GC, CL, and the Euro-focused products.

If you trade the overnight, keep position size smaller. A 5-lot on ES at 9:30 AM is a different beast than a 5-lot at midnight. The risk per contract doesn't change, but your ability to exit cleanly does.

The 3:00 PM to 4:00 PM CT Window

This is the danger zone. Volume starts dropping. The market-on-close orders create a final burst of activity around 3:00-3:15 PM CT, then things thin out. Newer traders often get caught holding a position into this window and end up scrambling to close before the 4:00 PM maintenance cutoff.

If you don't already have a position by 3:00 PM, I'd skip the last hour. The risk/reward of initiating a new trade with a hard stop in 60 minutes rarely makes sense.

What Time Zone Does Tradeify Use?

Tradeify operates on Central Time (CT), which aligns with the CME's headquarters in Chicago. All session times, maintenance windows, and daily resets reference Central Time.

If you're trading from a different time zone, convert everything once and save it. Here's a quick reference:

• Eastern Time (ET): Add 1 hour. 4:00 PM CT = 5:00 PM ET
• Pacific Time (PT): Subtract 2 hours. 4:00 PM CT = 2:00 PM PT
• UTC/GMT: Add 5 hours during CDT (summer), add 6 hours during CST (winter)
• Central European Time (CET): Add 7 hours during CDT, add 8 during CST

Daylight saving time shifts happen twice a year in the U.S. (second Sunday in March, first Sunday in November). If you're outside the U.S. or in a state that doesn't observe DST, the offset changes. Set a calendar reminder for both DST transitions. I've seen traders in Europe miss the shift and show up an hour late to the open.

The Tradeify dashboard shows your account time in CT. Your trading platform might display in your local time zone. Make sure you know which one you're looking at.

Frequently Asked Questions

What Are Tradeify's Trading Hours?

Tradeify's trading hours follow the CME Globex schedule: Sunday 5:00 PM CT through Friday 4:00 PM CT. There's a mandatory one-hour maintenance break every day from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM CT. All positions must be closed before the maintenance window begins. These hours apply to every Tradeify account type, including Select, Growth, and Lightning.

Can You Hold Positions Overnight at Tradeify?

Yes. Tradeify allows overnight position holding on all account types and all phases (evaluation and funded). You can carry a position through the evening, Asian, and European sessions without any rule violation. The only requirement is that all positions must be flat during the 4:00-5:00 PM CT daily maintenance break.

What Happens If You Hold a Position During the Tradeify Maintenance Break?

Tradeify will force-liquidate any open position at 4:00 PM CT when the maintenance window begins. The forced close can result in slippage, especially on less liquid contracts. Tradeify doesn't issue a formal rule violation for holding through maintenance, but the slippage from a forced liquidation can damage your P&L and push you closer to your drawdown floor.

Does Tradeify Restrict Trading to Specific Sessions?

No. Tradeify does not restrict trading to the regular session or any specific time window. You can trade at any point during CME Globex hours, from Sunday 5:00 PM CT to Friday 4:00 PM CT, minus the daily maintenance break. This applies to all three account families without variation.

What Time Zone Does Tradeify Use for Trading Hours?

Tradeify uses Central Time (CT), matching the CME Group's headquarters in Chicago. All session times, daily resets, maintenance windows, and daily loss limit calculations reference Central Time. Daylight saving time shifts apply, so the UTC offset changes twice per year.

Are Tradeify Trading Hours Different During Evaluation vs. Funded?

No. Tradeify trading hours are identical across evaluation and funded phases on all account types. Select evaluation, Select Flex funded, Select Daily funded, Growth evaluation, Growth funded, and Lightning funded all follow the same CME Globex schedule with the same 4:00-5:00 PM CT maintenance break.

Does Tradeify Close Markets on Holidays?

Tradeify follows the CME holiday calendar. When the CME closes for a holiday, Tradeify markets are also closed. Some holidays have early closes (typically 12:00 PM or 12:15 PM CT) rather than full closures. Tradeify does not send holiday notifications, so traders must check the CME Group holiday schedule independently.

When Does the Daily Loss Limit Reset at Tradeify?

The Tradeify daily loss limit resets at 5:00 PM CT when the new session begins. On Growth accounts with a $600 daily limit and Lightning accounts with a $3,000 daily limit, the counter starts fresh with each new session. Trades placed after 5:00 PM CT count toward the following day's loss limit.

What's the Best Time to Trade Futures on a Tradeify Account?

Tradeify doesn't restrict which hours you can trade, but the regular trading hours (8:30 AM to 3:00 PM CT) offer the tightest spreads and deepest liquidity on equity index futures. The first 90 minutes after the cash market open (8:30-10:00 AM CT) typically produce the most range and cleanest setups. Overnight sessions are tradable but carry wider spreads and thinner order books.

Do Weekend Gaps Affect Your Tradeify Drawdown?

Weekend gaps don't directly affect your Tradeify drawdown because markets are closed and no P&L is recorded. However, if you left a working order active on Friday and it fills at Sunday's open price during a gap, the resulting P&L will count toward your new session. Tradeify's EOD trailing drawdown recalculates at the next 4:00 PM CT close, so any Sunday evening losses feed into Monday's end-of-day calculation.

The bottom line: Tradeify's trading hours are as standard as it gets for a futures prop firm. Full CME Globex access, no session restrictions across account types, and overnight holding allowed. The only hard rule is the 4:00-5:00 PM CT maintenance break, and the only way to mess it up is by not being flat in time. If you can set an alarm for 3:50 PM and check the CME holiday calendar once a month, you'll never have a session-timing problem at Tradeify.