State of Trade Journaling 2025: Cutting Through the Noise in a Post-AI World

We are in interesting times. The market recently hit an ATH, and many impactful macro events are happening across the world. Even due to trade wars, AI, economic numbers/stats, and politics have made trading more challenging for many new traders. With AI, due to too much fake/inaccurate content, traders are starting to be more careful than ever when it comes to choosing tools that help with their trading. Due to this, there seems to be a decrease in higher-quality activity or trading content on social media and more activity in private circles and communities. What does any of this have to do with journaling? - "choice". 

Every trader has to make a decision on what set of tools they are going to be using for their trading - execution platform, charting, journaling/analysis tool, screener etc., Based on trends on socials and on web search, a vast majority of new (and even some older) companies are opting the way of AI where pretty much most of the content is AI generate and engagement is fake/artificial. This, over time, creates a rift in the perception of what is being offered vs what actually exists in the platform. 

The fallout from this environment is a deep-seated erosion of trust. When traders are burned by tools that are 95% marketing and 5% substance, they don't just lose faith in a single product; they become disillusioned with the entire category. A bad experience with an overpriced, underperforming journal can lead a trader to wrongly conclude that all journaling is a waste of time and money. However, a more resilient class of traders emerges from this disillusionment. They become more skeptical, more discerning, and less susceptible to hype. They stop trusting marketing claims and start demanding verifiable proof: public documentation, transparent feature comparisons, and risk-free trials. This "flight to quality" creates a market where platforms built on transparency and demonstrable superiority can thrive.

This report serves as a definitive guide for the serious trader navigating the landscape of 2025. It will dissect the current state of trade journaling, expose the industry's pervasive stagnation and marketing fallacies, and provide a clear, objective framework for choosing a tool that delivers genuine, verifiable value. The focus is singular: to equip traders with the knowledge to select a partner dedicated to helping them become better, every single day. This is not just a goal; it is the entire philosophy behind TradesViz.

The Great Disillusionment: Why Most Trading Journals Fail You 

A lot of the trend among newer traders still seems to be "follow the flavor of the month" rather than doing research to find what is most suited for oneself. This has led to more traders having a bad first taste due to falling into the trap of false promises and marketing by using tools that are 95% fluff. 

Let's take an example of the current state of some journals. 

Competitor 1: Probably larger marketing budget than development... and product experience speaks volumes here. We've had plenty of users returning from this service over the last 3 or so months. Reason? a) Not nearly worth the cost $($400+ /year),  b) Most features don't work as advertised, c) Plenty of essential features missing, d) deteriorating support d) Misleading features - saying they support future simulation but actually provide CFD data... and more...

Competitor 2: Has been in the market for quite a while, but has had zero improvements in years. Talks about AI in marketing, yet there's zero documented content or examples about it. Plenty of bugs, outdated UI, slow, overpriced, poor support. 

Competitor 3: Most basic of the 3 competitors, yet also (somehow) the most expensive. We see users moving over every week (simply based on the usage of our built-in import support for this platform, which allows users to switch seamlessly) due to how much they are missing out on recent improvements and advancements in journaling.

Competitor 4: A single annual price for a product that's a decade behind on trading anlaysis, marketed as "psychology" focused, yet still doesn't have basic tag features... We're not going to talk about anything else here because, actually, there is nothing. No simulators, no auto sync, no international broker support...

If you've read our previous state of journaling posts here and here, you may notice a recurring theme: A recurring theme of stagnation. The market appears to have stalled, with leading platforms suggesting that journaling is little more than basic trade recording. This is a profound failure of imagination and innovation.

This widespread stagnation imposes a hidden "Stagnation Tax" on every user of these platforms. This tax is not just the direct monetary cost, which is often inflated relative to the features provided. The more significant component is the opportunity cost. By using outdated or limited tools, traders are deprived of access to modern, powerful analytics that could genuinely accelerate their learning curve and improve their profitability. Every day spent on a stagnant platform is a day a trader falls further behind those using state-of-the-art tools. In the zero-sum game of trading, this is not just a personal loss; it is a direct competitive handicap. The decision to switch from a stagnant journal is an urgent move to eliminate this self-imposed disadvantage.

The Validation Framework: A Trader's Guide to Finding Truth

So, how do you gauge the quality of a tool? testimonials? reviews? blog posts? pricing? socials? 

Confusing, right?

The answer lies in shifting from a passive consumer to a discerning researcher. A simple yet powerful framework based on three pillars of trust can help validate any trading tool. A platform's commitment to these pillars is a direct signal of its focus on empowering the user, not just making a sale.

The Three Pillars of Trust

• Pillar 1: Accessibility (The "Try Before You Buy" Mandate) A company that is confident in its product will not hide it behind a paywall. The absence of a robust free tier or a no-credit-card-required free trial is a major red flag, signaling a lack of faith in the user experience.
  • The TradesViz Standard: TradesViz offers a "Free forever" account that is genuinely useful, allowing for up to 3,000 stock executions per month. Furthermore, any new user can start a 7-day free trial on any paid tier to experience the full platform, no questions asked. This represents the gold standard of accessibility.  
  • Competitor Contrast: In stark contrast, few competitors offer NO free trial at all. Some don't even have a free tier at all, making it
  • completely useless for newer traders. Ones that do have "trials" still hide the features behind paywalls even during trials.

• Pillar 2: Transparency (The "Show, Don't Tell" Principle) If a platform claims to possess a feature, it must provide public evidence. A lack of comprehensive, public-facing documentation, including detailed blog posts, FAQs, video tutorials, and a public changelog, all of these indicate that the company's focus is on selling the product, not on educating the user on how to maximize its value.
  • The TradesViz Standard: TradesViz maintains extensive, publicly available documentation, a detailed blog covering every feature, videos exploring all aspects of the dashboard, and brutally honest and unbiased competitor comparisons. On top of this, our socials are FILLED with examples and use-cases of real trading examples and how to utilize features of TradesViz every day - all of 1000s of posts are dedicated to this.
  • Competitor Contrast: Many competitors make bold claims about features like "AI" in their marketing, but provide little to no documented proof or examples of how these features actually work or add value. Not just AI, but it extends to every feature. We invite you to even try it out for yourself. Try searching for images of competitors, and you will see at most a few dashboard screenshots and plenty of completely useless (and mostly fake) calendar screenshots, which serve *zero* value to the viewer.

• Pillar 3: Support Quality (The Human Element) When a problem arises, the quality and accessibility of customer support become paramount. Key questions to ask are: Is support readily available? Is the staff knowledgeable? And most importantly, is the quality of support equal for all users, or is it reserved for the highest-paying customers?
  • The TradesViz Standard: All users, from those on the free-forever plan to Platinum subscribers, receive the same high-quality support from platform experts via live chat and email. There is no tiered system for support.
  • Competitor Contrast: Simply zero support for most users, even paying ones. Free users are stuck with FAQs (not even detailed videos or blog posts about features). Limited/No live chat, slow/delayed email support. Non-technical support staff. All of this is *very common* among competitors.

Now, moving to asset-specific features, we see a lot of demands and requests from different types of traders every single day. We're going to categorize it by asset types below, which can help you figure out which profile you fall under and look for relevant features.

Stock/Future traders: A high emphasis on risk management features such as MFE, MAE, trade plans, and tags. The requirements are simple, straightforward, and TradesViz satisfies 99% of these cases. 

Forex: Emphasis on backtesting/simulation. tags-based and time-based analysis. More focus on technicals and practice/backtesting because many forex traders want to try different strategies and be able to compare them/side by side. We have seen many forex traders even use TradesViz purely as an analytics partner, where they import and do account-level/filter-group comparison.

Options: The most complex requests come from options traders. It's not far-fetched to say that every other journal pretty much disregards options traders and their requests for features, simply because no other trade journaling company has in-house talent or experience to solve any of these problems. Unfortunately, this is *still* a problem, and we're only getting better at this as we speak to more traders every day. Total credit, debit, trade cost, DTE, greeks, option charts, payoff anlaysis, unrealized pnl - these are features ONLY available on TradesViz.

The verdict from the trading community confirms this reality. Forums are filled with users complaining about how poor the options support are on other journals and how even the popular competitors struggle with the basic logic of importing calls and puts correctly. In sharp contrast, users usually review TradesViz as being "miles ahead" of any competitor for options trading, analysis, and features - this is all easily verifiable by anyone using TradesViz. 

Not only this, we've also focused so much on options features purely because we want newer traders to understand and learn options better: Options simulator - a way to backtest strategies. Options chain simulator: Intraday trading practice for options.

This is not new. We're reiterating this because this is STILL the current state of trade journaling: option traders are left out.

Cryptocurrency/CFDs: Relatively new to trade journaling, as other journals still don't even support most of the crypto brokers or charting for crypto. Meanwhile, we have full support for all features such as best exit, charting, risk simulation, global simulator, etc., for ALL asset types. We are listing these features here because all crypto traders are asking for is the same level of support as journals have for stocks. We do exactly that and a little more. 

So next time you decide to pull the trigger on a particular platform, research well. Read the material they have - blogs, FAQs, videos, etc., If none exists, it simply means the focus is not on the product, it's on selling you the product. Next, look at the quality of each feature. Simply having features isn't sufficient - how useful is it to YOU? How can you MOLD it your trading style?

We say this very often in many of our posts and socials: There's no one-size-fits-all when it comes to trading journals. Here is where *we* are trying to improve - to make a dashboard that is easy to use, yet does not lack in utility. This is a *very hard* problem. TradesViz has traders with 30+ years of trading experience who zip through the platform like it's their trading platform, and we traders who *just* started trading who sometimes find the many charts a bit hard to digest at first. This brings us to the quality of support AND the quality of dedication YOU need to provide from your side.

At TradesViz, we keep our focus on solving the problems of traders - be it a simple solution or a complex solution, it is nevertheless a solution that no one has taken the effort to build or create. This intense focus on solving the hardest problem in trade journaling is a deliberate strategic decision. It creates a competitive "moat" built on technical complexity and deep domain expertise. When a stock, futures, or forex trader evaluates journaling platforms, the fact that TradesViz can flawlessly handle multi-leg options spreads with full Greek analysis serves as an undeniable signal of its overall engineering quality and technical competence. The logical conclusion for the discerning trader is clear: "If they can master that level of complexity, they can certainly handle my needs perfectly." This elevates the perception of the entire platform, justifying its reputation as the definitive tool for power users.

This value inversion is sustained by two factors: large marketing budgets that create a false perception of value, and customer inertia. The pricing of other platforms is not determined by their R&D investment or the utility they provide, but by what they believe the market can bear, propped up by relentless advertising. Their inflated prices are a tax on traders to fund their marketing departments.

TradesViz's pricing is not just "low"; it is a strategic weapon designed to expose this inefficient and anti-consumer model. By presenting this transparent, feature-for-feature comparison, the conversation shifts from a simple price check to a more critical discussion about fairness, value, and business models.

The conclusion is simple and ridiculous: paying 2-3x more for 1/5th of the features is an unsustainable proposition for any serious trader. This gap will get better as the feature list expands further in the coming months.

Escaping the "Want" Trap: Realigning with What You Truly Need

With dozens of unique tools for every aspect of trading, what do you *want*? and what do *need*? New traders need to draw a line here to simply prevent overspending.

Trading platform? free for most.
Charting? Plenty of free options + trading platforms already have it.
Screener? Plenty of free options + probably necessary if you have specific strategies.
Journal? Necessary - at least a paper one or Excel
Misc tools - options flow, fundamentals, SEC data, etc., - should be at the bottom of your list.

A critical discipline for every trader, especially those early in their journey, is the ability to separate what they truly need from what they merely want. 
Now, a journal here is essential, but of what type depends on how much you trade. It's simply a matter of time vs cost. 

Do you think ~$15-$20/mo for a trading journal that's mostly automated, auto-generates charts, shows analytics, allows you to write notes, see all your trading accounts in one place, etc., - a fair price? 

How much monetary value would you put on the dozens of hrs you spend on Excel/manual papers per week? $50? $100? 

The math is simple: look for value.

We're in an era where *most* things of value are cheap or free (if you are the product...). So when it comes to the $-spend on trading tools, look at how much time it saves you and how much utility it provides you - that's the most basic, simple, straightforward metric that applies to everyone. 

TradesViz already includes extensive automation like syncing from ~40+ brokers, auto AI summaries, automated commissions/targets, and more. What about other features? The "add-ons"? Actually... TradesViz has those too... trading simulator, options flow, fundamentals, seasonality, daily stock screener, and more... 

You may want a lot of these extra "add-ons", but in 95% of the cases, they don't help you that much. If you don't know the most basic principles of trading and if you can't read and anlayze a simple candlestick/bar chart, then these tools are going to be of zero help - that's the peril of going down the rabbit hole of trying to find your edge using tools that were created to make a quick buck from unsuspecting traders.

To reiterate, focus on the basics. Build strong foundations - these are your "needs". 

With the reduced attention span of the current gen traders, focus on real and serious anlaysis has (unfortunately) slightly diminished over time, and so has the general average new trader performance - this is not a coincidence. This is just the current trend based on our experience with what we've seen among traders and the industry since 2019. On the bright side, some traders are finally waking up to the fact that other journals have nowhere near enough data or analytics to power the needs and requirements of advanced strategies. This is why we introduced AI Q&A - 2 years AGO. Just think about that for a few minutes. If you have read the first few sections of this post that talk about the *current* pathetic state of other journaling systems, with all of these features, some of which were launched YEARS ago that are backed by extensive research, testing, and iteration with real users, just how far TradesViz is now in terms of providing value to users... - This too is a trend... :)

This trend is just starting and will only get stronger.

For a trader to fully understand this, there should be sufficient effort exerted and time spent on learning the systems. There is increasing expectation that trading will get easier, but in reality, it's only getting harder. Traders who understand the difference between "need" and "want" will know where to direct their efforts. This will translate to success down their trading path. 

Changes In Requirements 

So, what are traders using more these days? What features are resulting in a more positive impact? What has lukewarm perception? What didn't work at all? Here's a quick summary:

Increase in usage:

• Simulators
• Advanced metrics
• AI features
• Anything to do with automation

Decrease in usage:

• Fundamentals
• SEC-related data
• Public sharing-based features
   

In summary? ease of use, automation is on the high (as usual), and financial data related to longer-term trading is losing interest among newer traders. The former makes sense as tools are becoming increasingly "simple", traders expect their journals to be the same, and to do most of the manual work (importing, organizing, note generation, etc.). We've talked about this a lot in the past state of journaling posts - automation has been a #1 priority, but we're dropping it this time to neutral because there has been no interest among brokers to be more open to traders. So what happened? Traders simply moved to brokers that offered better API/automation support. It's quite simple. Age-old brokers relying on legacy customers may face difficulties in attracting newer, modern traders.

The decrease in usage for certain types of analysis and financial data because to current uncertainty in the market and just how crazy and unpredictable earnings have been for most companies. Traders need feedback, insights that are *immediately* actionable. "Real-time" is a word we've never used when it comes to data in TradesViz, but it may change soon to cater to current traders' demands. 

Talking about AI features, in 2025, "AI" has become the most overused and diluted term in the software industry. A gold rush is underway, with nearly every company scrambling to slap an AI label on its product, regardless of its actual utility. The trade journaling space is a prime example of this trend. Competitors aggressively market their "AI capabilities," yet a closer look reveals that these features are often just thin wrappers around a public API, locked behind the most expensive subscription tiers, or lack any public documentation to substantiate their claims.

The difference between a genuine, integrated AI strategy and a reactive marketing gimmick is best illustrated by a simple timeline:

Competitors (2025): In the current year, legacy platforms are just beginning to bolt on basic AI functionalities. For them, AI is a marketing reaction to a trend, a feature to be checked off on a comparison chart.

TradesViz (2023): TradesViz launched its AI Q&A feature two years ago and now has over 30,000 unique stats generated by users.

The Choice is Clear, The Proof is Public

So... what's the conclusion? Historically, we've shared a list of possible improvements, but it may be different this time. We talk about our improvements, next features, etc., in our changelogs, but we don't compare them to anything else. At this point, it should be crystal clear that the value offered by TradesViz is incomparable to anything out there (show us one objective review providing otherwise... we'll wait...). But that doesn't mean we stop here. Like we discussed in several sections in this blog post, there are a few unpolished edges, a few areas we have not explored, and the problem of "one-size does NOT fit-all" when it comes to navigation/UI/UX. We are working on these every day. You will see updates on our socials, blog as we continue to push the frontiers of what types of trade journaling and analysis for traders across the world. 

Our expectation for a change - this time, we hope, it comes from the end users because the power is in your hands.

Why? The ability to see through the noise is going to be an exceptionally important skill in navigating the post-AI world. This is the difference between taking a chance on the wrong tool, wasting time and money, only to think that all the tools of that category deserve the same feedback. The occurrence of this should reduce, and it's in the users/traders/viewers' hands - it's in YOUR hands. 

You can take a chance on a tool with flashy advertisements and hollow promises, wasting valuable time and money only to end up disillusioned. Or, you can invest a few hours in objective research, applying a rigorous validation framework to find a tool built on a foundation of verifiable value.

Spend more time doing objective research, read more, experiment more, and keep learning. Use tools that help with these goals. Don't quit because you didn't like the dashboard's color; instead, read the content, check the stats, and learn to see the true value past the superficial. A few hrs or a few days' worth of learning can be life-changing. Only this will lead to true, sustainable growth.

We do not ask you to believe our marketing. The proof of TradesViz's superiority is not hidden in a sales pitch; it is public, transparent, and irrefutable.

Try It: The ultimate test of any tool is hands-on experience. Sign up for the generous free-forever tier. Start a 7-day, full-featured trial of the Platinum plan. There is no risk and no financial commitment required to see the platform in its entirety.

Read It: Explore the extensive public documentation, the in-depth blog posts, and the detailed feature guides. Witness the depth, transparency, and relentless pace of innovation for yourself.

Compare It: Use the factual, data-backed comparison table in this report. Conduct your own feature-by-feature, dollar-for-dollar analysis against any other journal on the market.

We hope to keep providing objective reports such as these for a long time to come and wish to see the field improve more and provide more value to more traders. Your support in providing feedback, being a user, and a subscriber means a lot to us. Do you think we missed something? Or maybe we didn't give a fair comparison? Or wish to talk to us? Email us! Our team is always eager to hear from you!

See for yourself why thousands of serious traders are making the switch to a platform that respects their intelligence, empowers their analysis, and delivers unmatched value. Your edge is waiting.