The Refer Score is a number from 0 to 100. It is calculated, not assigned by hand, and it answers one question: how does this firm compare overall? It is built from ten categories: rule transparency, payout terms and reliability, trader reputation, challenge value, drawdown terms, trading flexibility, operating history, country access, platform choice and account scale.
A category only switches on once enough firms have comparable, verified data for it, at least a quarter of the firms we track. Until then it counts for no firm, and the categories that are on share the whole score between them. That is why every score today says it is based on currently verified data. As we research rules and payouts, more categories switch on and the score gets sharper.
| Category | Weight | Active today | Effective weight today |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rule transparency | 20% | Yes | 20% |
| Payout terms and reliability | 18% | Yes | 18% |
| Trader reputation | 16% | Yes | 16% |
| Challenge value | 12% | Yes | 12% |
| Drawdown terms | 10% | Yes | 10% |
| Trading flexibility | 8% | Yes | 8% |
| Operating history | 6% | Yes | 6% |
| Country access | 4% | Yes | 4% |
| Platform choice | 3% | Yes | 3% |
| Account scale | 3% | Yes | 3% |
| Total | 100% | 100% |
Currently active: Rule transparency, payout terms and reliability, trader reputation, challenge value, drawdown terms, trading flexibility, operating history, country access, platform choice and account scale. Effective weight today: 20% / 18% / 16% / 12% / 10% / 8% / 6% / 4% / 3% / 3%.
Rule Check does not change the Refer Score. Rule Check asks whether a firm suits the way you trade. A firm is not a worse firm because it does not suit your strategy, so nothing you tell Rule Check moves any score, and a firm can score highly and still be wrong for you.
Each active category is scaled from 0 to 1 across all the firms we track, so the best firm in a category scores 1 and the worst scores 0. That value is multiplied by the category's weight, the results are added, and the total is divided by the combined weight of the active categories.
Trader reputation uses a Bayesian average with a prior of 30 reviews. That stops a firm with four five-star reviews outranking one with nine hundred reviews averaging 4.7.
A firm with no data in an active category earns no points in it. Every firm is measured against the same total, so no firm can score higher by having less known about it. Every firm card shows this working under Why, and every firm page shows it under How we scored this.
Operating history carries real weight because survival is the strongest evidence available in this industry. Prop firms that fail almost always fail early, and they take funded accounts down with them. A firm that has paid traders through several years and a bad market has shown something no landing page can claim.
We earn a commission when you buy through our links. That commission has no input into the Refer Score. It is not one of the categories above, and there is no way for a firm to pay for a better one. Every score says whether we have an affiliate deal with that firm.
We do sell featured placement. Anywhere it appears it is labelled Featured. If it is not labelled, nobody paid for it.
The list also leads with the firms we have researched first-party, because a score built from public numbers cannot yet tell those apart from the ones we have only imported. That is an editorial judgement about research depth, not a paid position, and it never changes a firm's Refer Score.
A firm can change a rule on a Tuesday and say nothing. So every night a job re-reads the pages we watch, compares each one against the copy we stored, and files a diff when the wording moves. Anything it finds is queued for a person. Nothing a machine reads is published without one of us approving it, which is why the badge says the pages are watched rather than that the page is right.
The badge appears on a firm only where we hold a page for it and the watchers have run in the last two days. If the pipeline stops, the badge goes, rather than quietly ageing into a claim that is no longer true. Some firms block this server at their firewall; their pages are read by hand and carry no badge.
We do not print a last-checked date. A date says more about the calendar than about the firm: the same unchanged page reads as current on the Tuesday and neglected by the Friday. What matters is whether anyone is still looking, and that is what the badge answers.
We are not a regulator and we have no authority over any firm. Listing a firm is not an endorsement, and a high score is not a guarantee you will be paid. Trading carries risk of loss.