This is the whole path from "I just signed up" to "the coach just reviewed my trading", in the order that works. Ten to fifteen minutes if your terminal is already open. Each step links to the full page if you want detail.
1. Confirm your email (1 minute)
Open the email titled Confirm your SniperJournal account and click the button. The link works for 24 hours.
The click confirms your address and signs you in: the next thing you see is onboarding (step 2). You only see the sign-in page if the link was opened on a different device or by your mail app first — then sign in once with the email and password you chose (the email is already filled in) and onboarding opens.
The link works once. If a click says That link has expired or was already used, your email is already confirmed — press Sign in on that page; don't sign up again.
Nothing arrived? Check spam/promotions (Gmail: the Updates tab too). Still nothing: go to the sign-in page, enter your email and password, and click Resend link. Check the address you typed, too — a typo like hotmzil.fr means the email went nowhere; sign up again with the right address.
2. Finish onboarding (1 minute)
The confirmation link lands you here (or open /app/onboarding). Four screens: your name, currency and trading style; your plan (you can stay on Starter); a name and starting balance for your first account; done. You can change all of it later under Settings. Closed the tab halfway? Sign in and the app sends you back to onboarding.
The account you name on the third screen (say FTMO 100k) is an empty bucket until step 3 fills it — it doesn't pull anything in by itself. The last screen leads with Import a file on Starter and Regular, and with Connect a broker on Pro.
3. Get your trades in (5 minutes)
On Starter? Automatic sync comes with Regular and Pro, so your path is a file: export your history from the platform, drop it on Accounts & import, pick the account you named in onboarding as Account for this file, click Import. Three minutes, works from any device, and Import a file has the exact export clicks for MT4, MT5 and TradeLocker. Everything below this line is for automatic sync on Regular (every 30 minutes) and Pro (every minute).
Pick the one that matches you. You only need one.
| You trade on | Do this | Plan |
|---|---|---|
| MetaTrader 4 or 5 (recommended) | Quick connect — login, investor password and server; nothing to install or update, new trades every 30 min (Regular) or every minute (Pro), even with your PC off | Regular & Pro |
| MetaTrader 5, keep the password on your PC | Connect MetaTrader 5 — a small add-on in your terminal syncs every closed trade automatically | Regular & Pro |
| MetaTrader 4, keep the password on your PC | Connect MetaTrader 4 — same add-on, plus one All History click | Regular & Pro |
| TradeLocker | Connect TradeLocker — email, password and server, nothing to install | Regular & Pro |
| Anything, any plan | Import a file — export a statement from your platform, drop it on the Import page | Every plan |
On Starter? Import a file today — it's the same journal, and you can switch to automatic sync later without losing anything.
Trade from your phone only, or on a Mac? Quick connect and TradeLocker connect need nothing installed, so they work from any device. The MetaTrader add-on needs the desktop terminal (Mac MT5 is fine — File → Open Data Folder finds the right folder).
The three places people get stuck, so you don't have to:
- **Quick connect says Could not connect — almost always the server name. Copy it exactly from MetaTrader's File → Login to Trade Account** (e.g.
ICMarketsSC-MT5), and check you picked MT4 vs MT5 to match the terminal. - MetaTrader add-on shows
error 4014(MT4:4060) — you skipped the Allow WebRequest step. Tools → Options → Expert Advisors → tick Allow WebRequest for listed URL → addhttps://journal.marksfxacademy.com. Full fix in Troubleshooting. - MT4 only brought in the last few days — Terminal → Account History → right-click → All History, then wait for the next push.
You'll know it worked when Accounts shows your account with status ok and a last-sync time, and Trades has your history in it.
4. Tag your setups (3 minutes)
Open Playbooks and create one for each setup you actually trade — three or four is plenty. Then tag your last 20 trades. This is what lets the analytics (and the coach) tell you which setup pays and which one is costing you.
5. Ask the coach (2 minutes)
Open AI coach in the sidebar (Regular and Pro) and click Review my last 20 trades. Read it. Then ask the question that matters: What should I stop doing?
More on what to ask and how to get sharper answers: AI coach.
From here
- Every day: a pre-market plan in the morning, a close-of-day review in Daily journal. The coach reads both.
- Every Sunday: open the coach and ask for three rules for next week.
- Want a human second opinion? Book a 1-on-1 with Mark at
https://journal.marksfxacademy.com/book— bring your journal open and the one question that matters most. - Keep the terminal open if you're on the MetaTrader add-on — it only syncs while MT5/MT4 is running. Closed terminal, paused sync; nothing is lost, it catches up when you open it again. A VPS keeps it hands-off — or switch to Quick connect, which doesn't need the terminal at all.
Stuck anywhere? Troubleshooting has the fix for every message the app or the add-on can show. If it doesn't, reply to any SniperJournal email with what you tried and the exact message you see.