The short answer
The profit split is the percentage of your closed trading profit that the prop firm pays out to you, and in 2026 the standard sits near 80%, with the strongest firms rising to 90% through a scaling plan that rewards consistent performance. FTMO and FundedNext set the reference points, with FTMO at 80% rising to 90% and FundedNext at a base 85% advertised up to 95% (FTMO; FundedNext).
The headline number is the part every firm markets, and it is also the part that matters least in isolation, because payout speed and the firm's reliability in actually paying matter more than a few extra points. I compare the splits, the scaling mechanics, and the payout timing on this page, and the wider field is in the prop trading firms guide.
What a profit split actually is
A profit split is the division of realised trading profit between you and the firm that funded the account, expressed as the share you keep. An 80% split means that for every $1,000 of closed profit you generate on the funded account, $800 reaches your wallet and $200 stays with the firm as its fee for providing the capital (propfirmpaid).
The split applies only to closed profit, not to floating equity, which matters because a firm that pays on closed P&L can let you draw on realised gains while open positions remain at risk. Most firms calculate the split at the point you request a payout, against the profit booked since your last withdrawal or since funding.
I treat the split as the price of using someone else's capital, and the question is whether the leverage and the absence of personal risk justify the share you give up. For a trader without the capital to trade meaningful size, keeping 80 to 90% of profits on funded money is a strong deal, and for a trader who already has the capital, the split is a cost worth weighing against self-funding.
The headline splits at the major firms
FTMO is the reference standard, operating since 2014 and reporting over 200,000 funded traders, with a base 80% split that scales to 90% under its scaling plan and a 99.8% on-time payout rate (FTMO; track360). The split is consistent across its account sizes, which removes the guesswork from the comparison.
FundedNext, founded in 2022, leads on the headline number with a base 85% split that it advertises rising to 95% on CFD accounts, and it has funded over 60,000 traders across three challenge programs (FundedNext; track360). The higher split is part of a deliberate strategy to compete on trader economics rather than longevity.
| Firm | Base split | Top split (scaling) | First payout |
|---|---|---|---|
| FTMO | 80% | 90% | 14-30 days, then 1-2 days |
| FundedNext | 85% | up to 95% (CFD) | bi-weekly |
The table is the comparison in four columns, and the deeper operator-level detail for the two leaders is in the FTMO review. Most other reputable firms cluster in the same 80-90% band, because the split is now table-stakes and the real differentiation has moved to payout reliability and drawdown rules.
The scaling plan: how your split and account size grow
A scaling plan is the mechanism by which a firm increases your account size, and sometimes your split, as a reward for consistent profitable trading over time. FTMO's plan lifts the split from 80% to 90% and grows the account by 25% at a time once you hit profit milestones across multiple months (FTMO).
The scaling plan turns the headline split into a moving target, because the 80% a trader starts on is not the 90% they reach after several disciplined payout cycles. I treat the scaling plan as the real long-run economics of the account, and the base split as the opening offer rather than the destination.
Not every firm scales the split, since some keep the percentage fixed and grow only the account balance, which leaves you earning more dollars at the same share. Reading whether the scaling applies to the percentage or only to the size is the detail that separates two offers that look identical on the front page.
Payout speed and the first-payout gap
Payout speed is where firms that look similar on the split start to separate, because the time between requesting a withdrawal and receiving it can run from one day to a month. FTMO's first payout typically arrives 14 to 30 days after funding, with later requests processed in one to two business days (lunefi).
FundedNext pays on a bi-weekly cycle that halves the waiting period of the monthly-cycle incumbents, and it guarantees a 24-hour payout window with a small cash bonus if it misses it (FundedNext). For a trader whose income depends on the payout cadence, the difference between a two-week cycle and a monthly one compounds across the year.
I weight payout speed almost as heavily as the split itself, because a high percentage you wait a month to receive is worth less than a slightly lower one that lands in days. The first-payout waiting period is the firm's way of screening for traders who pass and then immediately over-trade, and it is the single biggest delay in the whole payout timeline.
Why the highest split is not always the best firm
The temptation to chase the highest advertised split is the trap that caught a generation of prop traders, because the firms most generous on paper have often been the ones most likely to withhold payment. A split you never receive is a 0% split, regardless of what the marketing page promises.
This is the lesson of the firms that collapsed or froze payouts in 2023 and 2024, where traders who chased an extra five or ten points of split lost their entire funded balance instead. The vetting process that screens for this risk is covered in the guide to prop firm transparency standards, and it matters more than the split itself.
I rank payout reliability above the headline percentage whenever the two conflict, because a 90% split from a firm that pays on time beats a 95% split from one that delays or denies. Longevity is the proxy here, since firms that have paid through multiple market cycles have the track record that newer entrants lack.
How to read a profit split in the full offer
A profit split only means something inside the rest of the offer, so I read it alongside the drawdown rules, the challenge fee, and the payout record rather than on its own. The maximum drawdown rules decide how long you survive to earn the split, and a tight drawdown at a high split can be a worse deal than a looser drawdown at a slightly lower one.
The challenge fee is the upfront cost of the option on the split, and a firm that charges more but pays a higher split needs to be evaluated on the net, not the gross percentage. The honest comparison is the expected dollars per dollar of challenge fee, accounting for the probability of passing and the drawdown constraints, which is a harder sum than the headline split invites.
I build the comparison from the split outward, layering in payout speed, drawdown, and reliability until the full picture replaces the single number. The what is prop trading guide frames the model, and this page is the layer that decides which firm inside it pays you the most for the risk you actually take.