How to Install MetaTrader 5 on a VPS

Scope and assumptions

This assumes a Windows VPS you can already reach over Remote Desktop with administrator rights, and an account from a broker that offers MetaTrader 5.

MetaQuotes documents the platform as running under Microsoft Windows 10 or 11. That is the published support statement. It does not extend to Windows Server editions, and this article does not claim it does. If your VPS runs a Server edition, confirm supportability with your provider and your broker before treating the platform as supported there.

Before installing anything, note what the machine reports as free memory and free disk while idle. That baseline is what later readings are compared against, and it is difficult to reconstruct afterwards.

Step 1: Connect over Remote Desktop

Use the Remote Desktop client on your own machine and connect to the address your provider gave you. Use the access method your provider documents. Do not open additional inbound ports or change firewall rules to make a connection work — if the documented method fails, that is a question for the provider, not something to route around.

Confirm the machine's clock is correct on this first connection. Certificate validation and log correlation both depend on it.

Step 2: Get the installer

Download mt5setup.exe from your broker where the broker publishes one. If your broker distributes a broker-specific build, it may already be pointed at their servers, which removes a step at first login. Arrangements vary by broker.

If your broker does not publish an installer, MetaQuotes distributes a general build and you add the server manually at first login.

Step 3: Run the installer

For a single terminal, run the installer and accept the defaults. Two documented options make the install reproducible, per the installation documentation:

• /auto runs the installer in automatic mode, without further interaction, installing to the standard path.
• /path:"[directory]", used with /auto, installs to a directory you choose.

mt5setup.exe /auto /path:"C:\Trading\MT5-Primary"

Choosing the directory deliberately matters, because a second terminal requires a second directory. That constraint is covered below.

Step 4: First launch and login

Start the platform and log in with your account number, password and the server your broker specified.

If the server does not appear in the list, that is an observation rather than a diagnosis. It is consistent with a general build, with a broker-specific build whose server list has changed, or with the server being named differently from what you expected. Verify the exact server name or address in your broker's account documentation, then add it manually.

Step 5: Verify, rather than assume

A terminal that opened is not a terminal that connected. Three checks make the difference visible.

The connection status. The status area shows a connection state and a figure for the current link. Treat it as a coarse health signal. MetaQuotes does not publish which endpoint that figure is measured against, so it should not be read as a measurement of the path an order takes. What the number is and is not is covered in the article on what affects trading VPS latency.

The Journal tab. This records authentication, connection and update events. A successful login and the server it reached are what you are looking for.

A chart that updates. Open a symbol your automation needs and see whether ticks arrive.

If a chart stays empty during hours you expect the symbol to trade, that is an observation, not a diagnosis. Possible causes include the account lacking a subscription for that symbol, the symbol not being enabled in Market Watch, the market being closed for that instrument, or a connection that has dropped since login. The next verification step is the Journal: check whether the terminal is still authenticated, then confirm the symbol's availability with your broker.

Step 6: What a disconnect preserves and what a reboot ends

These are different events with different consequences, and conflating them is the source of a lot of confusion.

Disconnecting a Remote Desktop session detaches you; it does not itself terminate the session. Microsoft's documentation for the tsdiscon command states that "any applications running when you disconnected the session are automatically running when you reconnect to that session with no loss of data". The Terminal Server walkthrough describes the same behaviour from the other side: on disconnect, "the processes and all virtual memory space will remain".

What happens to a disconnected session afterwards depends on configuration. Microsoft's guidance on RDS session locks and disconnections documents session time limit policies under Remote Desktop Session Host > Session Time Limits, and states that "other RDS session time limit policies determine the behavior after a session is disconnected". A configured limit can therefore sign out a disconnected session later. Check the policy on your machine rather than assuming a disconnected session persists indefinitely.

Signing out ends the session. The same document states that after a user logs off, "all processes associated with the SessionID are terminated". The terminal closes.

Restarting Windows also ends every running process, including the terminal. Nothing in the platform's documented startup options causes it to reopen by itself after a restart.

So: close the Remote Desktop window, or use the disconnect action, when you want the terminal to keep running. Use Sign out when you intend to stop it.

After any restart, treat the platform as not running until you have reconnected, started it, and repeated the Step 5 checks. Automating that startup is possible, but an unattended-logon or scheduled-task recipe has security consequences that depend on your environment, and this article does not offer one.

Step 7: Influence when Windows restarts

Windows installs updates and restarts. An unpatched internet-facing machine is a worse problem than an inconvenient restart, so the goal is to influence the timing rather than prevent it. Influence is not full control: update deadlines and centrally configured policy can override the window you set, and Microsoft's guidance describes deadline settings under which restarts occur regardless of active hours.

Active hours are the period Windows treats as in use, and automatic restarts happen outside them. Microsoft's guidance on managing device restarts after updates documents the default as 8 AM to 5 PM, notes that users can change it, and states that later Windows versions support a maximum active hours range of 18 hours. That page documents Windows client behaviour; if your VPS runs a Server edition, confirm the equivalent settings for that edition rather than assuming the same interface.

Set active hours to cover the sessions you actually trade. Microsoft notes that directly editing the registry for this "isn't recommended", so use the Settings interface or Group Policy.

Active hours change when a restart happens. They do not start the platform again afterwards. A restart scheduled outside your trading window still leaves the terminal closed until someone opens it.

Running more than one terminal

The constraint is documented: "two copies of the platform cannot run from the same directory". The platform start documentation says to "install the appropriate number of programs in different directories".

Separate directories are the documented requirement for running simultaneous copies.

mt5setup.exe /auto /path:"C:\Trading\MT5-Secondary"

Portable mode is a separate, optional startup flag, /portable, which the same documentation describes as making the platform store its data in the installation folder rather than the Windows user directory. It is not required for running multiple copies.

It also carries a documented permission requirement: to run in portable mode the user needs administrator rights with UAC disabled if the platform is installed in Program Files, or write permissions to the installation folder if installed elsewhere. Disabling UAC weakens the machine and is not a step this article recommends. If portable mode is useful to you, installing outside Program Files is the option that does not require it.

How many instances a machine will carry is a separate question, covered in how many MT5 terminals can run on a VPS.

Before you walk away

1. The Journal shows a successful login to the expected server.
2. Charts update on the symbols your automation needs.
3. Any expert advisor shows as enabled, with algorithmic trading enabled both globally and on the chart.
4. Active hours cover your trading window.
5. You disconnected rather than signed out.
6. You recorded the machine's memory and disk figures.

Reconnect later in the session and repeat checks 1 and 2. A second reading taken while the platform has been running unattended tells you something the first reading cannot.

Where this stops

This covers installing, verifying and re-checking a platform. It does not cover sizing the machine for a workload, which depends on charts, indicators, history depth and expert advisor behaviour. It does not cover automatic restart after maintenance. And it is not advice about trading: whether an expert advisor should run at all is outside its scope.

If you are still deciding whether to move off a local machine, the operational comparison with a home PC covers that on its own terms. Current plan specifications live on the hosting plans for MetaTrader workloads and the full plan comparison.