The Best MetaTrader 5 Features That Actually Make Trading Easier (And the One Most Traders Overlook)

Most traders approach MetaTrader 5 the same way they approached MT4: log in, pull up a chart, place a trade, close the window. And that works—until you realize you’re treating a multi-asset, 64-bit trading system like a glorified order pad.

The real question isn’t whether MT5 is “better” than MT4. It’s whether you’re actually using the features that make MT5 worth the upgrade. Here’s what separates the platform from its predecessor—and where most traders stop short.

What MT5 Actually Gives You That MT4 Doesn’t

The headline difference is market coverage. MT5 supports a wider range of asset classes—stocks, indices, commodities, and cryptocurrencies alongside forex—where MT4 was built largely around currency pairs . If you trade anything beyond forex, MT5’s native multi-asset structure saves you from cobbling together multiple platforms.

Under the hood, MT5 runs on a 64-bit multi-threaded architecture, which means faster processing and heavier workloads. For traders running multiple charts, backtests, or automated strategies, that’s not a nice-to-have—it’s a day-to-day performance difference .

Then there are the tools. MT5 gives you 21 timeframes instead of 9, 38 built-in technical indicators instead of 30, and six pending order types instead of four—including the Buy Stop Limit and Sell Stop Limit orders that MT4 simply doesn’t support . The Depth of Market (DOM) feature, which MT4 lacks, shows liquidity at different price levels in real-time, giving you visibility into where the actual orders sit .

The integrated economic calendar is another differentiator. Instead of bouncing between the platform and an external site for interest rate decisions or employment data, it’s built right in .

For automated traders, MT5’s strategy tester is multi-threaded and supports multi-currency, multi-asset backtesting. MT4’s tester is single-threaded and far more limited . If you’re coding EAs, MQL5 is more complex than MQL4—but it’s also faster and more capable.

The Capability Most Traders Ignore

Here’s the gap: all these features—the advanced charting, the DOM, the economic calendar—they’re all designed for analysis and execution. But once you’ve entered a trade, what’s your workflow?

Most traders keep the MT5 terminal open on their desktop all day, monitoring positions and watching for opportunities. That means the platform sits in your taskbar, visible to anyone walking past, demanding your attention even when you’re trying to focus on something else.

MT5 does not have a built-in solution for this. You either keep it open and visible, or you close it and lose visibility into your open positions.

Where Camovia Tray Fills the Gap

Camovia Tray turns MT5 into a system tray tool—so you don’t need the full terminal open just to check your positions or get a quick price update. Hover over the tray icon, and you see your watchlist’s real-time quotes. Pull up the floating order window, and you see all your open positions: symbol, direction, lot size, open price, and current P&L .

One-click from a position card, and you can close that trade—with a two-step confirmation to prevent accidents. On MT5, this works without needing any extra setup; the app reads data directly from the terminal, locally, without sending anything to the cloud or any external server .

If you’re running MT5 alongside other work, you can hide the main terminal window entirely—it disappears from the taskbar and Alt+Tab switching, and you restore it from the tray when you need it .

For anyone who’s ever kept MT5 open all day just to monitor a few positions, this changes the workflow: you get the visibility without the desktop real estate, and without broadcasting your trading activity to anyone in the room. Camovia Tray also includes icon camouflage and privacy lock features, giving you control over visibility when it matters most .

All of this runs on Windows 10 and 11, with a free trial available. Plans start at $2.49 per month, and the data never leaves your computer .

The Bottom Line

MT5’s best features—speed, multi-asset support, advanced order types, and automated trading—make it a genuinely capable platform. But if you’re still leaving the terminal open all day just to monitor positions, you’re not getting the full benefit.

The real workflow improvement isn’t more indicators or faster backtesting. It’s being able to keep MT5 running in the background, check your positions in seconds, and get back to what you were doing—without the terminal taking over your screen.

Because the best trading setup isn’t the one with the most features. It’s the one that stays out of your way until you need it.