What Is a Trading Journal?

A trading journal template is a comprehensive record of all your trades. It typically includes information such as trade date, asset, direction (buy/sell), entry and exit points, reason for trade, profit/loss, position size... By keeping a trading journal, you can identify patterns, spot common mistakes and refine your trading strategies.

Why You Need a Trading Journal Template

A Trading Journal template should allow you to measure every detail of your trading method, as it will provide the information you need to know if your strategy is profitable or will bankrupt you. ⬇️

You will have one or more trading strategies that you want to ensure that they work in the long term, and for this, you will need to know when it works (see which session gives better results, at what time the opportunity usually arises, you will discover that the days of the week have different impacts), how well it works (win rate, RR ratio, ROI)... in short, as in any profession, you must professionalize your procedures, your decision-making, and control every variable that affects your business.

How to Make a Trading Journal Template

Creating a Trading Journal template is easy once you know this. A spreadsheet will allow you to record all this in an organized manner. Whether it's enough or if you need to move to other software depends on your needs. Here are the primary software options for a Trading Journal:

Trading Journal Excel Template

Excel used to be a popular tool for creating trading journals because of its robust features. With a trading journal Excel template, you can create customized formulas, tables and charts to visualize your trading data.

Notion Trading Journal Template

Notion is a versatile productivity tool that allows users to create customizable templates for various purposes. A Notion trading journal template can be a great choice if you prefer a more visually appealing and flexible advanced format. With Notion, you can add tables, text, images, and even automated statistics to your trading journal. You can also create multiple pages within the same template, allowing you to organize your trading notes in a way that suits your trading model.

At the end of the post I will show you examples of what can be done with Notion in relation to trading.

Trading Journal Google Sheets Templates

Google Sheets offers similar functionality to Excel but with the added benefit of cloud-based storage and real-time collaboration. A trading journal Google Sheets template is an excellent option if you want to access your journal from multiple devices or collaborate with others (although this is also offered by Notion).

A typical Google Sheets template might be:

So basically, just create a page or spreadsheet in one of these options and define columns to measure all the data you need. I use Notion because it also allows each row to contain a page, where I can add notes related to the specific trade. I even have a template with my trading model that I fill out for each operation.

If you want to know which variables I measure, I'll leave you the link to my own trading journal. You can even get it if you consider your time is worth more than $9.

Check out my Trading Journal

I also leave here the template that I use in my daily work, which, besides the Trading Journal, includes many other things (like I said, it depends on each person's needs, and in my case, a spreadsheet alone is not enough).

Check out my Trading Workspace

0 comments

I don't want to dedicate myself to trading

Group trades by date in Notion and display accumulated PnL

Update [The Trading Journal + The Trading Suite]: Setups Library 📚

Launch: The Trading Journal [$9] + Updates The Trading Suite

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