Trade times and seconds: why a time looks wrong
Every trade is stored to the second, in UTC, and shown in your profile timezone. A file whose times carry an offset is exact. A file with bare times is read in your profile timezone, and the preview lets you pick another zone for that file. If every trade is off by the same number of hours, that zone is the fix.
If times are off by whole hours
- 1
Check Settings > Profile > Timezone. It says "Currently" and the zone. "Follow this computer" uses your browser's zone every time you open Actal; "Pin a timezone" fixes one.
- 2
On the import preview, look for "File timestamps are in". It appears only when the file's times had no offset. Pick the zone the platform writes in and click "Apply and re-check".
- 3
For MetaTrader, that zone is your broker's server time, often GMT+2 or GMT+3. For thinkorswim it is US Eastern unless you changed it. For TradingView it is the chart's timezone.
- 4
Already imported? Delete those trades on the Trades page and import the file again with the right zone. Delete removes the fingerprint, so the file is not treated as a duplicate.
Which zone each file is read in
| Export | Times in the file | Read as |
|---|---|---|
| TopstepX, MotiveWave, tastytrade | Carry an offset (+00:00, Z) | Exact. Your profile zone is not used. |
| Rithmic | Column headers name the zone, e.g. Update Time (EDT) | That zone. The preview notes it. |
| Webull | Stamped EDT, EST and so on | That zone. |
| Tradovate, NinjaTrader, Sierra Chart, Quantower without an offset, ATAS, custom CSVs | Bare times | Your profile timezone, or the zone you pick on the preview. |
| MetaTrader 4 and 5 | Broker server time | Your profile timezone, or the broker's server zone if you pick it. |
| thinkorswim | US Eastern by default | Your profile timezone; set America/New_York on the preview if yours differs. |
| Robinhood | Dates only | Each trade at 12:00 New York on its date. |
US abbreviations in a file are fixed offsets: EDT is UTC-4, EST UTC-5, CDT UTC-5, CST UTC-6, MDT UTC-6, MST UTC-7, PDT UTC-7, PST UTC-8. ET and CT follow New York and Chicago, including daylight saving.
Where seconds show
- With seconds, 24-hour clock: the Date column of the trades table, the trade review header (entry date and time, then exit time), the fills list on the trade page, and a friend's shared trades.
- Without seconds: the phone cards on the Trades page, the review queue, the ideas page, group posts and the import preview rows.
- Hold time is rounded to whole seconds and written as "42 sec", "6 min 32 sec", "2 h 5 min" or "3 d 4 h". Minutes are rounded once a trade is over an hour, hours once it is over a day.
- There is no 12-hour display option. Times always show as 24-hour.
Trades added by hand
The Add trade form on the Trades page has Entry time and Exit time fields that take seconds. Type 00 if you do not know them. The note under the form says: "Times are in your profile timezone, down to the second". An exit before the entry is refused. Once a trade is saved, its times cannot be edited; delete it and add it again.
Which day a trade counts on
A trade is dated by its exit time, in your trading day. By default that is the calendar day it closed, in your timezone. A trade opened at 23:50 and closed at 00:10 counts on the second day. If you trade the US session from Asia or Europe and want your days to follow it, see The trading day setting.
Questions people ask
Did this not answer it?
Ask from the Feedback page in the app. The founder answers every question there, and the answer ends up in this help centre. Not signed in? Email hello@actal.io.