Account Types, and What Actually Changes Between Them

An account type is a pricing choice, not a rank

Retail firms usually offer several account types with names that suggest a hierarchy: standard, premium, professional, VIP. Very little of what separates them is service quality. What actually changes is the cost structure, the minimum size, the leverage available, and in one case the legal protections attached to the client. Reading the tier names as a ladder of quality is how people end up on an account whose cost model does not suit the way they trade.

Spread-only against raw plus commission

The main split is how the firm takes its margin. A spread-only account builds the markup into the quoted price and charges nothing separately. A raw or commission account passes through a tighter market spread and charges a fee per lot, usually per side. Neither is inherently cheaper. Which one wins depends on the pair, the size and the hour: commission is a fixed cost per lot while a spread is a variable one, so the commission model tends to look better on larger positions in liquid pairs and worse on small ones in thin conditions.

Size tiers

Cent, micro, mini and standard accounts differ in contract size, which changes the smallest risk that can be expressed rather than the cost per unit traded. A smaller contract lets a position be sized sensibly on a small balance instead of forcing an oversized one — that is a risk-management feature, not a discount. Worth checking is whether the same instruments, the same leverage and the same execution apply on the smaller tier, because sometimes they do not.

Swap-free accounts

A swap-free or Islamic account removes the overnight interest adjustment for religious-compliance reasons. The cost rarely disappears; it usually reappears as a wider spread, a fixed administration charge per lot per night after a grace period, or a restricted instrument list. The eligibility conditions and the point at which charges resume are the two things to read, and both live in the account documentation rather than on the comparison page.

The professional classification

This is the one tier where more than pricing changes. In several jurisdictions a client meeting set criteria can be reclassified as professional or elective professional, which lifts retail leverage caps and simultaneously removes protections that attach to the retail category. Depending on the regime that can include negative balance protection, certain disclosure requirements, access to an ombudsman scheme, and eligibility for a compensation scheme. It is a trade, and the leverage side of it is the part that gets marketed.

Comparing tiers honestly

A tier comparison only means something with the variables pinned down: the same pair, the same position size, the same time of day, a full round turn rather than one side, and commission converted into the same units as the spread before the two are added together. The account that is cheapest at one lot on a major pair during the busiest session may not be the cheapest at a tenth of that size on a cross at the rollover.