Trading Checklist: 10 Questions Before You Enter
A compact pre-entry trading checklist covering trend, level, trigger, stop, size, reward, volatility, news, and review.
· 5 min read · checklist, discipline, entry, risk
A trading checklist is a friction device. It slows the impulsive click long enough for your plan to speak. The checklist should not predict the market; it should confirm that your trade is planned, sized, and reviewable.
The 10 questions
Three-node practice loop: predict the next candle, reveal the outcome, journal the lesson — then repeat.
Use these before entry. If the answer is unclear, skip or reduce risk. A skipped trade is data too.
- What is the higher-timeframe bias?
- What exact setup am I trading?
- Where is the level or zone?
- What candle or trigger confirms entry?
- Where is the stop and why?
- What is the position size?
- Is the target realistic?
- Is volatility normal or expanded?
- Is there news or an event risk?
- What will I record after the trade?
Keep one red-line rule
One rule should instantly cancel the trade: no stop, no trade. Other rules can be graded, but a missing invalidation point means risk is undefined.
Review failed checklists
When you skip a trade, record why. Later, check whether the skip rule protected you or was too restrictive. This turns non-trades into useful training examples.
Real example: checklist preventing a bad MSFT entry, March 2024
MSFT pulled back to its 21 EMA on March 8, 2024, forming a small hammer near $400. A trader running the 10-question checklist would have hit a problem at question 8 — volatility. The VIX had risen two days earlier on regional banking news and MSFT's ATR had expanded from its normal $4 to over $8. With that one answer flagging "expanded volatility," the correct action was to either skip or halve position size. Traders who ignored the volatility check and sized normally got stopped out the same afternoon when MSFT printed a $9 range candle — double the normal noise.
Common checklist mistakes
Patterns that make checklists ineffective even when traders technically use them:
- Answering "yes" to every item because you want to take the trade — the checklist becomes confirmation bias rather than a filter.
- Using a checklist with too many items (15+) that cannot be completed before the entry window closes, leading to rushing or skipping items.
- Treating the checklist as a one-time setup rather than tracking whether each item's answer was correct in post-trade review.
Run the checklist on every simulator rep →
This article was written and reviewed by the founder. AI tools may assist with drafting; every fact, figure, and example is verified by the author before publishing.