An EA that trades every two days on average will go four days without a trade about once in every seven gaps. Before you restart anything, that number matters.
The idea: judge an EA's silence against its own rhythm, not against your patience.
Step 1. Find its average gap. Count trading days only. Example: 61 trades over 120 trading days gives 60 gaps, so the average gap is 120 / 60 = 2 days.
Step 2. Turn a gap into odds. If entries arrive roughly at random around that average, the chance that a gap lasts at least G days is about e^(−G / average gap).
| Silence (average gap 2 days) | Chance it is just normal | Roughly |
|---|---|---|
| 2 days | 37% | 1 gap in 3 |
| 4 days | 14% | 1 in 7 |
| 6 days | 5% | 1 in 20 |
| 8 days | 1.8% | 1 in 55 |
| 10 days | 0.7% | 1 in 150 |
Step 3. Set two lines per EA. "Quiet" at about 5% (6 days here): look at the terminal. "Dark" at about 1% (about 9 days here): assume something is broken until you prove it isn't.
The part most people miss: the same four-day silence is routine for this EA and close to impossible for a scalper that averages one trade every 6 trading hours. For the scalper, four days is 16 average gaps, and e^(−16) is about 1 in 9 million. One fixed "alert me after N days" rule is either too slow for your fast EAs or too noisy for your slow ones.
Real EAs cluster around sessions, news filters and volatility, so treat these odds as a guide, not a test.
VRD Insight makes this comparison for every EA on the account: one row per magic number, with an activity marker (active, quiet or dark) measured against that EA's own usual gap. It is read-only, so it tells you an EA has gone quiet, not why.
What to do today: work out the average gap for each of your EAs and write its 5% and 1% silence lines next to its name.
Try it: VRD Insight is free. Add it to a demo chart and see every EA's activity marker in one panel.
https://www.mql5.com/en/market/product/204799
Next step: Try the free demo of VRD Terminal Health in the Strategy Tester to see the readiness panel that rules the terminal in or out when an EA goes dark (restart check and alerts run live only). $44 to buy, or rent for $30 for 1 month or $39 for 3 months.
https://www.mql5.com/en/market/product/205568
Virtual Risk Desk
All figures are illustrative and assume entries arrive at random around the average. Educational content, not trading or investment advice.
