Best MT4 Brokers in Australia (2026)

Summary

• MT4 isn’t dead in Australia. Eighteen of our 30-broker shortlist still offer it as an alternative to MT5 or proprietary platforms.
• For raw spreads and EA-friendly execution, IC Markets and Pepperstone are the two we’d open first.
• For lowest all-in cost, Fusion Markets and Global Prime sit at the top of the shortlist.
• For free VPS hosting (useful if you run EAs around the clock), IC Markets and Pepperstone both offer one with a qualifying balance.
• MT4 itself isn’t an AFSL holder. Your protection comes from the broker’s licence, not the platform.

Quick comparison: top MT4 brokers in Australia

Broker	Account types on MT4	EUR/USD typical (RAW)	Commission per side	EAs allowed	Free VPS	AFSL
Pepperstone	Standard, Razor	0.09 pips + AUD 3.50	AUD 3.50 / 100k	Yes	Yes (Active Trader tier)	414530
IC Markets	Standard, Raw Spread	0.0 pips + AUD 3.50	AUD 3.50 / 100k	Yes	Yes (AUD 5k balance)	335692
FP Markets	Standard, Raw	0.1 pips + AUD 3.00	AUD 3.00 / 100k	Yes	Yes (qualifying balance)	286354
Eightcap	Standard, Raw	0.1 pips + AUD 3.50	AUD 3.50 / 100k	Yes	No	391441
Fusion Markets	Classic, Zero	0.0 pips + AUD 2.25	AUD 2.25 / 100k	Yes	No	385620
Blueberry Markets	Standard, Raw	0.1 pips + AUD 3.50	AUD 3.50 / 100k	Yes	No	334590
ThinkMarkets	Standard, ThinkZero	0.1 pips + AUD 3.50	AUD 3.50 / 100k	Yes	Yes (qualifying balance)	424700
Axi	Standard, Pro	0.2 pips + AUD 3.50	AUD 3.50 / 100k	Yes	Yes (Pro tier, AUD 1k+)	318232
Vantage	Standard, Raw, Pro	0.0 pips + AUD 3.00	AUD 3.00 / 100k	Yes	Yes (qualifying balance)	428901
Global Prime	Standard, Raw	0.0 pips + AUD 3.50	AUD 3.50 / 100k	Yes	No	385620
AACY Securities	Standard, ProZero	0.0 pips + AUD 3.00	AUD 3.00 / 100k	Yes	No	403863
GO Markets	Standard, GO Plus+	0.2 pips + AUD 3.00	AUD 3.00 / 100k	Yes	No	254963
Mitrade	Standard	Variable	None (spread-only)	Limited	No	398528
FXCM	Standard, Active Trader	0.2 pips + AUD 4.00	AUD 4.00 / 100k	Yes	Active Trader tier	309763
MultiBank Group	Standard, ECN	0.0 pips + AUD 3.00	AUD 3.00 / 100k	Yes	No	416279
AvaTrade	Standard	0.9 pips (variable)	None (spread-only)	Yes	No	406684
Forex.com	Standard, RAW Pricing	0.2 pips + AUD 5.00	AUD 5.00 / 100k	Yes	No	465984
trading.com	Standard, Active Trader	1.0 to 1.5 pips (Standard); RAW + commission (Active Trader)	Active Trader tier	Yes	No	443670

Spread averages pulled from each broker’s published spread page on 6 May 2026. AFSL numbers verified against ASIC Connect.

All eighteen brokers hold an Australian Financial Services Licence and are members of the Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA). All apply ASIC’s Product Intervention Order leverage caps to retail clients: 30:1 on major forex pairs, 20:1 on minor pairs and gold, 10:1 on other commodities, 5:1 on share CFDs and 2:1 on cryptocurrency CFDs.

Top picks for AU MT4 traders

Pepperstone: the all-rounder

Pepperstone (AFSL 414530) launched in Melbourne in 2010 and has been one of the two MT4 brands most AU traders cycle through. The Razor account prices EUR/USD at around 0.09 pips raw plus AUD 3.50 per side commission. That’s roughly 0.7 pips total cost equivalent at AUDUSD 0.65, putting it level with IC Markets and a notch above the standard non-RAW competition.

Pepperstone supports all common EAs, runs Equinix NY4 servers for sub-millisecond execution from MT4 New York, and offers a free VPS to clients on the Active Trader tier. The mobile MT4 build is the standard MetaQuotes one, no proprietary skin. We rate Pepperstone 9/10 for active MT4 traders.

For the full deep-dive, see the Pepperstone review.

IC Markets: closest thing to true ECN MT4 in Australia

IC Markets (AFSL 335692) is the other obvious starting point. The Raw Spread account averages 0.0 pips on EUR/USD plus AUD 3.50 commission. Liquidity comes through a multi-bank ECN model with NY4 hosting. EAs run without restriction. Free VPS hosting is available with a AUD 5,000 balance and 5+ standard lots per month.

Where IC Markets wins narrowly is depth on exotic pairs and metals. AUD/JPY and gold typically print tighter than at Pepperstone in our weekly snapshots, though the gap is small. For AU scalpers and EA traders, this is the broker we test most.

FP Markets: quietly strong

FP Markets (AFSL 286354) holds an AFSL since 2005, making it one of the longer-running ASIC MT4 names. Raw account pricing sits at 0.1 pips + AUD 3.00 per side. The execution stack uses Equinix LD5 (London) and NY4 (New York) connectivity. EAs are fine. FP Markets isn’t always on the marketing radar but the cost structure is among the cheapest in the AU market.

Fusion Markets: lowest-cost MT4 broker we cover

Fusion Markets (AFSL 385620) runs the cheapest commission in our 30-broker set: AUD 2.25 per side per 100k traded. EUR/USD on the Zero account averages 0.0 pips raw, taking total cost to roughly 0.45 pips equivalent. There’s no free VPS programme and the product range is narrower than the bigger names, but for pure cost-per-trade on MT4 forex, Fusion is hard to argue with.

Eightcap: under-rated MT4 build

Eightcap (AFSL 391441) is a Melbourne-headquartered broker that runs an unusually well-tuned MT4 environment. Spreads are competitive (0.1 pips + AUD 3.50 on the Raw account) and the broker has put genuine engineering work into MT4 plug-ins, including a sentiment indicator that pulls aggregated client positioning into the platform. EAs work fine. No free VPS, but a respectable starting point for AU traders who want MT4 without the largest brands.

What MT4 still does well

MT4 launched in 2005. It’s been the default retail forex platform for the better part of two decades. The reason it’s still in use isn’t sentiment.

MQL4 expert advisors. Tens of thousands of EAs were written for MT4 between 2005 and 2018. Many are still in active use. Porting them to MT5 isn’t a click-of-a-button job. For traders running legacy automation, MT4 is the home platform.

Custom indicators. The MT4 indicator catalogue is enormous. Pivot points, supply and demand zones, harmonic pattern recognition, divergence flags. If you’ve spent years tuning your chart setup with custom indicators, MT4 is where they live.

Simplicity for new EA builders. MQL4 is closer to C than MQL5 is. For traders who’ve never coded, the language is more approachable. Beginner EA tutorials lean heavily on MQL4 examples.

Broad broker support. Every major AU broker except CMC Markets and IG Markets offers MT4. That breadth means you can shop spreads and execution without learning a new platform.

Built-in strategy tester. Backtesting in MT4’s strategy tester is rough by modern standards (single-thread, single-pair, tick data quality varies) but it’s there, free, and good enough for a first pass on a new strategy.

Where MT4 falls short

Honest about the trade-offs. MT4 is a 2005 platform shipped with 2010 finishing touches. It shows.

One asset class. MT4 was designed around forex. Indices, commodities and shares are bolted on through CFD overlays. If you trade multi-asset, MT5’s design is closer to fit-for-purpose.

No depth-of-market. MT4 doesn’t show level-2 quotes. If you want DOM, you need MT5 or cTrader.

Single-thread backtester. Backtesting on MT4 is slow and limited to one pair at a time. Walk-forward analysis is awkward. Most serious quants have moved to MT5, Python or external frameworks.

Limited timeframes. MT4 ships with nine timeframes (M1, M5, M15, M30, H1, H4, D1, W1, MN). MT5 has 21. If you trade two-hour or three-hour charts, you need workarounds in MT4.

No native economic calendar. MT5 has one built in. MT4 doesn’t.

MetaQuotes ended new MT4 licences in 2018. New brokers can’t issue fresh MT4 server licences (with limited exceptions). The platform is in maintenance mode.

For most active traders this stack of limitations doesn’t matter. For traders running multi-asset systems or modern backtesting workflows, MT5 is increasingly the better starting point. We’ll dig into that in MT4 vs MT5.

ASIC, AFSL and what regulation actually covers

The platform isn’t regulated. The broker is. That distinction matters because most AU traders use “MT4” as shorthand for “my MT4 broker”, and the protections come from the second part of that phrase.

When you open an MT4 account with Pepperstone, you’re a client of Pepperstone Group Limited (AFSL 414530), and your ASIC protections apply to that relationship. The same MT4 software run by an offshore broker without an AFSL provides none of the same protections, even though the platform interface is identical.

ASIC’s retail protections that apply to AU MT4 accounts at any of the 18 brokers above:

• 30:1 leverage cap on major forex pairs (AUD/USD, EUR/USD, GBP/USD, USD/JPY and others)
• 20:1 cap on minor pairs and gold; 10:1 on other commodities; 5:1 on shares; 2:1 on crypto
• Negative balance protection (mandatory for retail clients)
• Margin close-out at 50% of initial margin
• Bonuses and inducements to retail clients banned
• AFCA membership for free dispute resolution
• Segregated client money rules under the Corporations Act
• AUSTRAC reporting and ID verification on account opening

If a broker advertises 500:1 leverage or a deposit bonus to AU retail clients, they aren’t ASIC-regulated. The Product Intervention Order has been in force since 29 March 2021 and was made permanent in 2024. There’s no AU loophole.

How to choose between the AU MT4 brokers

Five questions narrow the field quickly.

1. Are you running EAs? If yes, prioritise raw spreads (IC Markets Raw, Pepperstone Razor, Fusion Zero, FP Markets Raw) and an NY4-hosted VPS. The cost difference between a 0.5 pip spread and a 1.0 pip spread compounds fast on a high-frequency EA.

2. What’s your typical trade size? Below 0.5 standard lots, the spread matters more than the commission. Above 1 lot, the commission starts to matter. Fusion’s AUD 2.25 commission is genuinely lower than the AUD 3.50 from most competitors. At 200 lots a month, that’s an AUD 250 difference.

3. Do you need a VPS? If you run EAs, latency to the broker server matters. IC Markets, Pepperstone, FP Markets, ThinkMarkets, Vantage and Axi all offer free VPS at qualifying balance tiers. If you don’t qualify, expect AUD 30 to 80 per month on a third-party MT4 VPS.

4. Multi-platform or MT4-only? Pepperstone, IC Markets, FP Markets, Eightcap, Fusion Markets and Vantage all also offer cTrader or MT5. If you might want to migrate later, those are worth shortlisting.

5. Where’s the broker hosted? Most AU MT4 servers run out of Equinix NY4. If you’re trading mainly during the AU/Asia session, an LD5-hosted broker (FP Markets) gives a marginally faster fill.

Setting up MT4 with an AU broker: quick walkthrough

The flow is similar across all the brokers above. We’ll use IC Markets as the reference, but the steps map cleanly.

1. Open the account. Online application, AUSTRAC ID verification (driver’s licence or passport plus proof of address), typically approved within 24 hours.
2. Fund the account. PayID and bank transfer are usually fee-free. Card deposits sometimes carry a fee depending on the broker. AUD base account avoids conversion fees.
3. Download MT4. Direct from the broker’s website. Don’t use third-party MT4 downloads, the broker server addresses are pre-baked into the broker’s installer.
4. Log in. Credentials are emailed once the account is funded. Server name will be broker-specific (e.g. ICMarketsSC-Live01).
5. Set the chart timeframe and load any indicators or EAs. Drag and drop into the Navigator panel.
6. Test on demo first. Every broker offers a free demo. Run any EA there for at least a week before going live, and confirm spreads on demo match live (some brokers run wider spreads on demo).

If you’re moving from one MT4 broker to another, your custom indicators and EAs port directly. They’re stored in MQL4/Indicators and MQL4/Experts in the broker’s MT4 data folder. Copy across and you’re up.