Margin is the good-faith deposit your broker holds to open a leveraged position — not a cost, but capital set aside while the trade is live. The higher the leverage, the smaller the margin, but also the thinner your buffer. Use this calculator to see exactly how much margin a position requires before you commit.
Required margin is the notional value of the position divided by your leverage. Equivalently it is the notional multiplied by the margin requirement, where the margin requirement is one over the leverage:
Notional value = lots × contract size × price (in base currency terms)
Margin rate = 1 ÷ leverage
Required margin = Notional value × Margin rate
= Notional value ÷ leverage
Example — 1.0 lot EUR/USD, 1:100 leverage, USD account:
Notional = 1.0 × 100,000 = €100,000 ≈ $100,000
Margin rate = 1 ÷ 100 = 1%
Required margin = 100,000 ÷ 100 = $1,000Decide the lot size first with the position size calculator, confirm pip economics with the pip value calculator, and compare leverage and margin terms across the broker comparison before funding.
No. Margin is your own capital, held aside while the trade is open and released back to your free margin the moment you close it. The only running cost is the overnight swap.
A warning that your equity has fallen close to the margin you have committed. If it keeps falling to the stop-out level, the broker closes positions automatically to protect the account.
Regulators such as the FCA and ESMA cap retail leverage (typically 1:30 on majors) because high leverage magnifies losses as much as gains. Higher caps are common offshore.