If you’re day-trading with a prop firm and on MT5, then you’ve likely experienced that thrill when you click to buy or sell—and immediately after, want to take it back or reverse it slightly. Whether it’s moving a stop-loss, raising your take-profit, or simply canceling a pending order before it’s executed, being able to manage orders without messing them up is essential. And when you’re trading on someone else’s dime at a prop firm, errors aren’t merely frustrating—they might get you disqualified from the challenge or even lose you your funded seat.
So, if you don’t want to experience those dreadful instances while attempting to cancel or change an order in MT5, let’s go through the whole procedure step by step.
Why Does It Matters for Prop Traders?
You are trading under rigorous guidelines, such as risk-to-reward ratios, maximum drawdown limits, and daily loss caps. You may break regulations you didn’t even want to by making a mistake, including sending an order on the incorrect symbol, altering the wrong order, or trying to cancel something that has already been filled. One mistake and the challenge was unsuccessful.
Being an expert in this field means understanding how to modify or cancel orders in MT5 without causing any issues.
Types of Orders You May Cancel or Modify
There are two general types of orders in MT5, you’ll work with:
- Market Orders – These are placed immediately at the prevailing price.
- Pending Orders – These are programmed to trigger when price is at a predetermined level (Buy Limit, Sell Limit, Buy Stop, Sell Stop, etc.)
Once a market order has been completed, it cannot be canceled. You can change it by adjusting the SL (Stop Loss), TP (Take Profit), or even physically closing the trade. You have greater freedom when there are pending orders. Price, volume, expiry, and cancellation options are all available.
How to Modify an Order in MT5
Suppose you have an open Buy Limit but the price is now moving quicker than anticipated. You want to adjust your entry or perhaps tighten your stop-loss.
This is what you do:
- Open the ‘Trade’ window at the bottom of your MT5 platform. This indicates your open trades and pending orders.
- Right-click the pending order that you wish to alter.
- Click ‘Modify or Delete’ from the drop-down menu that appears.
You will notice a modification window pop up. Here, you can:
- Adjust price level like where the trade should be executed
- Change SL and TP
- Set or modify expiration date/time
- Once you’ve completed the required adjustments, click Modify.
And you’ve updated your order.
Note: MT5 may give you an error if you try to modify an order close to the current market price. This is due to the fact that brokers (and prop companies) often permit a minimum gap between the market price and the execution of pending orders.
Step-by-Step: Adjustment of an Active (Open) Order
If your trade is already in the live state, you can’t adjust the entry price—it’s taken. However, you can adjust:
- Stop-loss
- Take-profit
- Volume
Here’s how:
- Navigate to the ‘Trade’ tab.
- Right-click on the open position.
- Open the ‘Modify or Delete’ menu.
- Modify the SL and/or TP fields.
- Press ‘Modify’.
Pro Tip: Alternatively, you can use the chart itself. If the SL or TP levels are already plotted on the chart, you can click and drag them to new levels. Super convenient. Just be careful not to drag the wrong one by mistake.
How to Cancel Orders in MT5
You can cancel pending orders alone. Once a trade is live, you have only two choices: modify or close the position.
Step-by-Step: Canceling a Pending Order
- Navigate to the Trade tab.
- Locate the pending order you wish to cancel.
- Right-click it.
- Choose Delete.
- Confirm if prompted.
- And ta-da, the order is erased.
Common Mistakes
Error: Invalid Price When Adjusting a Pending Order
This occurs when your new entry price is close to your current market price. Instant funding prop firm brokers usually implement a freeze level—a minimum number of points from the current price.
Solution: Pull the entry price further away—attempt 10-20 points from the current market price to be cautious.
Error: Order Modify Error or Trade Context Busy
This one usually pops up when MT5 is processing another action at the same time—like another order placement or modification.
Fix: Wait a few seconds and try again. If it keeps happening, restart the platform. It’s annoying, but it works.
Error: Invalid SL/TP
This means you’re trying to place your SL or TP on the wrong side of the market. For example:
- For a Buy trade: SL should be lower than the entry, and TP should be higher.
- For a Sell trade: SL should be higher than the entry, and TP should be lower.
Fix: Verify your direction and ensure SL/TP follow the logic.
Can You Modify Order Size?
Let’s get this straight because it catches many traders out.
Short answer: No, you can’t adjust the size of a position once it has been filled.
To increase exposure, you’d have to open a new trade in the same direction. To decrease it, you can close half of the position manually (if your broker permits partial close).
