Topstep $6k Challenge Review: High Risk, High Reward

Topstep has released its fifth Labs experiment, the $6K Challenge, offering traders a fixed $6,000 payout for a $149 one-time fee.

The format will be familiar to anyone who followed Topstep’s previous $3K Challenge and $1.5K Challenge.

You have to make $6,000 twice without losing $2,000 in either round. There are no consistency rules, daily loss limits or minimum trading days, and successful traders keep the full $6,000 payout.

It is a high-risk, high-reward challenge with a potentially huge return on the $149 fee. However, I don’t think it offers anywhere near the value of the original $3K Challenge, and at this price you are entering the territory of more serious funded-account evaluations with a much better chance of eventually reaching a payout.

In this article, I’ll explain how the Topstep $6K Challenge works, how it compares with the previous Labs Challenges and whether it is worth buying.

How The Topstep $6K Challenge Works

The $6K Challenge costs $149 one-time, with no subscription, activation or reset fees.

Like the previous Challenges, it has two separate rounds:

You first need to make $6,000 without hitting the $2,000 maximum loss limit.

Pass the Challenge Round and the account resets for the Payout Round, where you have to achieve exactly the same result again.

Complete both rounds and Topstep pays you a fixed $6,000 payout. There is no 90/10 profit split, so you keep the full amount, and the account then closes.

As with the previous versions, this is not really a traditional funded account.

You are paying for the opportunity to complete two difficult simulated trading challenges in exchange for a one-off cash payout.

How Difficult Is The $6K Challenge?

The $6K Challenge has a 1:3 drawdown-to-profit-target ratio.

You have $2,000 of maximum drawdown to make $6,000, and then need to repeat the same thing again. That is extremely difficult from a risk perspective.

The static drawdown does help. Unlike an end-of-day trailing drawdown, the $2,000 loss floor never moves upwards as you make money.

For example, if you reach $3,000 in profit, you would effectively have $5,000 of room before failing.

There is also no consistency rule, daily loss limit or minimum trading day requirement. This means aggressive traders can take large risk-to-reward trades without worrying about one profitable day increasing their target.

However, the maximum position size is only one mini or 10 micros. That is exactly the same contract limit as the previous $3K Challenge, despite the new profit target being twice as large.

So while the drawdown has doubled, your maximum position size hasn’t. This makes the $6K target slower to reach for anyone already trading close to the contract limit.

$6K Challenge vs $3K Challenge

The original $3K Challenge remains the benchmark for these Labs experiments. It cost just $49 and offered a $3,000 fixed payout.

The new $6K Challenge doubles the payout and drawdown, but the price has more than tripled. The original challenge therefore gave you significantly more potential payout for every dollar spent.

A $49 fee for the chance to receive $3,000 was unusually attractive because the potential reward was more than 61 times the entry cost.

At $149 for a $6,000 payout, that drops to around 40 times the fee.

That is still a huge potential return, but the risk hasn’t improved at all. You still need to complete the same 1:3 challenge twice.

Better Than The $1.5K Challenge

The $6K Challenge does improve on some of the problems I highlighted in my $1.5K Challenge review.

The $1.5K version cost $39 but restricted traders to just two micro contracts, making it much harder to reach the target quickly.

Topstep has restored the one-mini / 10-micro limit for the $6K Challenge.

The payout-to-fee ratio is also slightly better:

• $1.5K Challenge: around 38.5x
• $6K Challenge: around 40.3x
• $3K Challenge: around 61.2x

So I prefer the $6K version to the $1.5K Challenge. But neither comes close to the value Topstep offered with the $3K release.

$149 Is Now Serious Evaluation Money

The biggest problem with the $6K Challenge is the price. At $149, this is no longer a cheap experiment where you can justify taking a high-risk shot at a large payout.

For exactly the same $149, Topstep currently sells its $100K Trading Combine with no activation fee. The normal $100K Combine also has a $6,000 profit target, but gives you a $3,000 maximum loss limit rather than $2,000.

That means the standard Combine has a 1:2 drawdown-to-profit-target ratio, compared with 1:3 on the $6K Challenge.

You only need to pass that evaluation once before progressing to an Express Funded Account.

The trade-off is that the normal Combine has a 55% consistency target and uses end-of-day trailing drawdown, while the $6K Challenge has a static loss limit and no consistency rule.

But the standard account is designed for something much more valuable: repeated payouts and eventually the opportunity to move onto real capital. The $6K Challenge pays once and closes.

Which Has The Better Chance Of A Payout?

I would expect a normal Topstep-funded route to have a significantly higher chance of eventually producing a payout for a disciplined trader.

The $6K Challenge requires you to achieve a 300% return on your available drawdown twice in succession.

With the $100K Combine, you have $3,000 of drawdown to reach the same $6,000 target, and only need to pass the evaluation once before moving into the funded stage.

It is not an identical comparison because the normal Combine has consistency requirements and trailing drawdown, followed by funded payout rules. But from a pure risk-to-target perspective, it gives you considerably more room.

Topstep’s own 2025 statistics show that 16.8% of Trading Combines were successfully completed, while 33.3% of individual traders who reached the funded level received a payout.

There is no published payout rate for the new $6K Challenge yet, but given the two consecutive 1:3 targets, I would expect it to be significantly lower. That is an important consideration when both products can cost you $149 upfront.

High Risk, High Return

The argument in favour of the $6K Challenge is obvious. If you can pass, turning $149 into a $6,000 payout is an exceptional return.

There are also very few restrictions getting in the way. You can pass quickly, one large winning day does not hurt you, the drawdown is static and the payout has no profit split.

For a trader who specifically wants to take a high-risk shot at a one-off payout, that can be appealing. But the potential return needs to be viewed alongside the probability of getting there.

You are effectively being asked to make three times your maximum allowable loss, reset the account, and then do it again.

There is very little room for an ordinary losing streak.

Purchase Limit and Expiry

Topstep has released 10,000 $6K Challenges, available on a first-come, first-served basis. Each trader can buy up to five, and closed accounts still count towards that limit.

The $6K Challenge has a 90-day lifespan for both rounds.

The five-account limit is separate from Topstep’s previous $3K and $1.5K Challenge limits. There are no resets.

Is The Topstep $6K Challenge Worth It?

I think the $6K Challenge is interesting, but much harder to justify than the original $3K offer.

The potential reward is excellent. A $6,000 payout from a $149 entry fee is still more than a 40x return on the challenge cost, and the static drawdown, lack of consistency rules and no minimum trading days give aggressive traders plenty of flexibility.

But you’re paying significantly more for the same underlying 1:3 challenge structure.

At $49, the $3K Challenge felt like a relatively cheap high-risk bet with enormous upside. At $149, the comparison changes.

You can now spend the same amount on a $100K Topstep Combine with no activation fee, receive more drawdown relative to the same $6,000 target, and potentially build an account capable of making repeated payouts. For most traders, I think that is the more serious option.

Conclusion

Overall, the Topstep $6K Challenge is a high-risk, high-return offering. If you pass both rounds, receiving $6,000 from a $149 fee is obviously an excellent result.

The static drawdown and simple rules also mean skilled aggressive traders can attempt the challenge without consistency or daily loss restrictions getting in the way.

However, I don’t think it offers the same value as the original $3K Challenge.

The payout has doubled, but the price has more than tripled, while the drawdown-to-profit-target ratio remains exactly the same and the maximum contract size hasn’t increased.

More importantly, $149 is now in the price range of serious funded-account evaluations. At that point, I would rather buy an account with more forgiving risk parameters and the possibility of repeated payouts, even if the maximum immediate upside is lower.

The $6K Challenge therefore makes the most sense for traders who understand that they are taking a low-probability shot at a very large fixed return. For traders focused on consistently reaching payouts rather than maximising the return on a single challenge fee, a traditional funded-account route is likely to make more sense.