# Listeners and modes

A listener connects one Telegram group or channel to Relay2Trade, with its own mode and rules. This article covers adding a listener, groups with topics, the modes Watch, Manual and Auto, approving signals, switching a listener off, dry runs, a listener's own settings and how many listeners your plan runs at once.

## What a listener is

A listener is one Telegram group or channel plus the rules for its signals. Each listener belongs to one profile (one MetaTrader 5 account) and has:

- a name, which you can change at any time; its history stays attached;
- the group or channel it reads, and for a group with topics, the topics it reads;
- a mode: "Watch — record only", "Manual — wait for my approval" or "Auto — trade immediately";
- an on/off switch;
- its entry rules, its own symbol list and, under "Settings of its own", any profile setting it should use differently.

The app reads the group through your own Telegram account, connected for that profile, on the computer or VPS where the app runs. Your Telegram account only has to be a member of the group; it does not need to be an admin, and the app never posts anything. Telegram has to be connected and the profile's trading switched on for any listener to read (see https://relay2trade.com/help/connecting-telegram.md).

A new listener reads from the moment it is added. Messages posted in the group before that are not fetched and are never traded.

## Add a listener in the app

You need an active plan to add a listener.

1. Open "Listeners" and click "+ Add listener".
2. Next to "Group / channel" click "Choose…". The list shows the groups and channels your connected Telegram account is in, with a search box. Pick the group. The name fills in from the group's title.
3. Leave "Mode" on "Watch — record only" for the first days.
4. There is nothing to save. The listener is kept as soon as it has its group, and it starts reading at once.

For a public channel you have not joined, you can also type its @handle in "Group / channel".

An open listener shows its settings in four groups: "Group and mode" (name, group or channel, topics, what the group usually trades, calls without a number, mode), "Entry", "Symbols" and "Settings of its own". Its on/off switch sits beside its name, and "‹ Your listeners" goes back to the list. Under the groups are "Set up with questions", "Dry runs" and "Remove listener".

## Add a listener in the Desk

In the Desk on relay2trade.com, listeners sit under Connections, below the Telegram of their profile.

1. Open Connections and find the profile's Telegram. If Telegram is not connected yet, the button reads "Connect Telegram to add one".
2. Press "Add". In "Add a listener", use "Search your chats" and pick the group. A group with topics is marked "group with topics".
3. Check the "Name" and choose "How it trades": "Watch — record only", "Manual — wait for my approval" or "Auto — trade immediately".
4. Press "Add listener".

Tap a listener to open "Its settings". Each listener card also shows its month in one line, for example "130 signals, 58 traded in 30 days", its "Listener on" switch, "Dry runs" and "Remove listener".

With more than five listeners on a profile, a search box sits above them: "Search listeners: a name or a chat". Type part of a listener's name, or of its group's or channel's name, to narrow the list. When nothing fits it says "No listener matches that."

## Groups with topics

Some Telegram groups are split into topics: signals in one, results and discussion in others. For the app it is still one group, so a listener on it reads every topic until you choose.

1. Open the listener and, under "Group and mode", press "Choose…" next to "Topics". In the Desk the button is "Choose topics".
2. Tick the topic where signals are posted and press "Use these".
3. The choice is saved by itself. "All topics" reads the whole group again.

In a discussion topic, any member's message is read like the provider's, and "close all" written there can close your trade. Tick only the signals topic.

Two listeners can share one group by topic, for example one on "Gold signals" in Auto and one on "Forex signals" in Manual. A message goes to one listener only: the first in the list that reads its topic. On a group without topics that is always the first listener, so a second listener on the same chat hears nothing, and the app says so: "Reads the same chat as … and a message goes to one listener only: this one hears nothing. Remove one of them, or give each its own topics."

Every signal shows the topic it came from next to the listener's name, for example "Gold VIP › Signals".

## The three modes

**Watch — record only.** The app reads every signal and records it, and places nothing. The record says what your rules would have done at that moment: "On Watch, so nothing was placed. Had it traded, the app would have placed this signal as follows.", with each order and its lots, stop-loss and take-profit, or the reason it would have skipped the signal. The group's follow-up messages are recorded and never applied. A listener on Watch produces no notices in the bell. Signals read on Watch count toward your daily signals like traded ones. New listeners start on Watch.

**Manual — wait for my approval.** Each signal waits for you for 10 minutes, with "Trade it" and "Dismiss", and the bell tells you it is waiting. The group's follow-up messages are applied directly, without asking you, once you have switched follow-ups on (see https://relay2trade.com/help/how-a-signal-is-read.md).

**Auto — trade immediately.** The signal goes through your rules and is placed within seconds, usually in under a second from the message reaching the app.

A good order is to start a new group on Watch, move it to Manual to confirm each signal, and to Auto once you trust it. A dry run (below) shows in minutes what Watch shows over days.

To change the mode, open the listener and, under "Group and mode" (in the Desk: "This group"), set "Mode". The change is saved by itself.

### Switching a group to Auto

Auto places real orders with nobody checking in between, so the app asks you to confirm it once per group.

1. Set "Mode" to "Auto — trade immediately".
2. Tick "I understand that orders will be placed on my account automatically, and that the results are my responsibility."
3. Click "Turn on auto". "Keep …" leaves the previous mode.

Set your sizing and a daily loss limit before a group trades on Auto (see https://relay2trade.com/help/sizing-and-risk.md and https://relay2trade.com/help/daily-limits.md).

### Signals that wait for you on Auto

Some signals wait for your approval even on an Auto listener:

- a signal that repeats one placed in the last minutes: "Duplicate — you already received this signal" or "Possible duplicate — very close to one you just received", with "Open the original signal";
- a signal posted while the app was away (closed, asleep, offline) and still younger than "Max signal age (min)": "Posted about 4 min before the app picked it up, after the connection came back — check the price first";
- a signal stopped only by "Max signals open at once", the profile's or the listener's own: "Max signals open at once is 1 and that many are running, so this one waits for you." Its button is "Force placement", which trades it past that limit only;
- a signal against the listener's open trades on the same symbol, when "Opposite-direction signals" is set to "Ask me".

## Approving signals

Signals that wait for you are listed:

- in the app, on the Dashboard under "Awaiting your approval";
- in the Desk, under Signals → "Waiting for you", with a banner on the Overview ("1 signal waits for your approval") and its "Review" button.

Each waiting signal shows the listener, what was read (side, symbol, stop-loss and take-profits), the start of the original message and the minutes left.

- **"Trade it"** places the signal at the current price. Every check runs again at that moment: the licence, the trading switch, MetaTrader being connected, and all your limits. If the price has moved further from the entry than the listener's "Max entry deviation", the signal is skipped and the reason says so. "Max entry deviation" is off unless you set it, so check the price before you press "Trade it". The app then says whether it was placed ("Traded: 1 order placed.") or "Not placed" with the reasons.
- **"Dismiss"** drops it. It shows as rejected: "Dismissed from the approval list: not traded."
- **Nothing within 10 minutes**: the signal expires and stays in the signal list as expired: "Its time to be approved ran out: not traded."

The waiting list survives a restart or an update of the app. A signal answered somewhere else, or one whose time ran out, answers "This signal was already handled, or its time to be approved ran out."

## Switching a listener off, or removing it

Switch a listener off with the switch beside its name in the app, or "Listener on" in the Desk. The list then shows "Off" under its name. While it is off:

- the app does not read the group, and messages posted there in that time are never processed later;
- the group's follow-ups ("close", "SL to BE") are not read either;
- trades it already placed stay open with their stop-loss and take-profit and keep being managed: take-profits, trailing and runners;
- a waiting limit order of that listener that expires is cancelled instead of entering at market;
- it does not count toward your plan's listeners.

To stop trading a group while still recording what it posts, set its mode to Watch instead.

"Remove listener" asks "Remove this listener? Its signals stay in your history."

## Dry runs: test a group on its past messages

A dry run puts a group's latest messages through the same AI reading and the same rules the app uses live, then replays each trade it would have placed on MetaTrader's price history. Nothing is placed.

### How many messages and how many runs

| | 7 days | Basic | Advanced | Pro |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Messages read per dry run | 25 | 25 | 50 | 100 |
| Dry runs per month | 10 | 15 | 25 | 35 |

The messages are the group's latest messages as they came, chatter and follow-ups included. Dry runs have their own monthly allowance, separate from your daily signals, and the month is the calendar month. A run that has started counts, even if it stops before the end. The shop sells extra dry runs.

### Running one

1. Open the listener and click "Dry runs".
2. Click "Run it on the last … messages": 25 on the 7-day plan, 25 on Basic, 50 on Advanced and 100 on Pro. The Desk shows how many runs are left this month, for example "3 dry runs left this month, of 15."
3. You can close the window: the run goes on, and the app tells you when it is done ("Dry run finished for …").
4. Read the results. Click "Would skip" to see only the skipped signals.

A dry run needs what live trading needs: the listener switched on, Telegram connected, trading switched on for the profile, MetaTrader logged in to your broker, and an active plan. The app reads the chat, so it has to be running, also when you start the run from the Desk. A run has 10 minutes.

### How a dry run judges each message

- Each message is judged as it would have been when it was posted: the trading days and hours apply as they stood then.
- The price is MetaTrader's price at the moment the message was posted.
- Your account is taken as it is now: balance, settings and limits.
- Follow-ups are listed under "Follow-ups" with whether they would be followed, and are never applied.
- Only the topics the listener reads are replayed.

### What the results show

The five tiles are "Messages read", "Signals found", "Would trade", "Would skip" and "Replayed result", for example 25 · 9 · 6 · 3 · +148.20 USD. The filters are "Signals", "Would trade", "Would skip", "Follow-ups", "Not signals", "Errors" and "All messages".

Each row shows the verdict ("would trade", "would skip", "not a signal", "follow-up" or "error"), the order with its lots, entry, stop-loss and take-profit, the reasons, the start of the message, and what the replay found for each take-profit: "hit", "stopped" (in the Desk "stop-loss hit"), "never filled", "still open", "closed before the weekend", "closed at its time limit" or "cancelled: the other side entered first".

The replay uses five-minute bars, fills each order at the open of the next bar, and leaves out commission and swap, so the result is a guide. It follows each trade for up to a week after the message; a trade still open then shows as "still open", with its floating result. When every row is skipped for the same reason, that reason is one setting you can change.

### Test trades

Each would-be trade is kept in the Signals list marked "Test" (filter "Tests (dry runs)"). Test trades count nowhere: not in your statistics, not in your daily signals, not in the duplicate check. A new run on the same listener replaces its earlier test trades; the runs and their results stay, listed under "Earlier runs" in the app and "Runs" in the Desk. "Remove test trades" in the app, or "Delete the dry-run signals" in the Desk, tidies the Signals list and keeps the runs.

After "Set up with questions" on a listener, "Try a dry run" shows what your answers would have done with the group's latest messages.

## A listener's own settings

Each listener has its own rules, so a careful group and an aggressive one can run side by side on one profile:

- **"Entry"**: "Entry mode" (Market or "Limit (at the entry or better)"), "Max entry deviation", stop orders and straddles, and what to do when the price is already better or already past a take-profit. Each is explained in https://relay2trade.com/help/entry-and-pending-orders.md.
- **"Symbols"**: only these symbols from this group. Empty takes everything your profile allows.
- **"What does this group usually trade?"**: the instrument for messages that name none.
- **"Read calls without a number"**: reads short calls such as "GOLD BUY NOW".
- **"Settings of its own"**: "Add a setting of its own…" gives the group its own value for most profile settings: size, take-profits, trailing, runners, stop-loss rules, spread and slippage limits, trading days and hours, and the group's messages after a signal. In the Desk each setting has an "Its own" switch. Whatever the listener does not set follows the profile.

Nine limits can also be set per listener, only tighter than the profile's: "Max traded signals per day", "Max daily loss", "Daily profit target", "Max open positions", "Max open positions per symbol", "Max signals open at once", "Max total lots", "Max lots per symbol" and "Pause between signals (seconds)". The listener's own limit counts only its trades, and whichever limit is reached first stops.

"Set up with questions" on an open listener asks about that group and sets its rules for you. Every setting is explained in https://relay2trade.com/help/settings-overview.md and at https://relay2trade.com/features/settings.

## How many listeners your plan runs

Your plan sets how many listeners run at the same time, counted across all your profiles together:

| | 7 days | Basic | Advanced | Pro |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Listeners running at once | 1 | 2 | 4 | 6 |

- A switched-off listener does not count. A group added on two profiles counts as two listeners.
- Level 10 adds one listener for good, and level 40 one more. Cards such as "One extra listener for 30 days" add one for a while.
- You can always create one more listener. When the limit is full, it is created switched off, with the note "Your plan allows 2 listeners running at once, across all profiles. Switch one off to switch another on." (with your plan's number)
- When your allowance goes down (a card ended, a smaller plan), the newest listeners over the limit are held off: "Listener … switched off: your plan allows … running at once. Switch another off to bring it back." Nothing is deleted. When the plan allows them again, they come back by themselves: "Listener … is on again: your plan allows it."

Plans and prices are in https://relay2trade.com/help/plans-licence-billing.md.

## If something goes wrong

- **Signals show up and nothing is traded.** The listener is on Watch. Set "Mode" to Manual or Auto. If the mode is right, open a signal and read its reason (https://relay2trade.com/help/why-a-signal-was-skipped.md).
- **A new listener does nothing.** Your plan's limit of running listeners was reached, so it was created switched off. Switch another one off, or raise the limit.
- **A signal disappeared from the approval list.** Approvals expire after 10 minutes. The signal stays in the signal list, marked as expired.
- **The app reads the chatter in the group as signals.** The group has topics and the listener reads all of them. Tick only the signals topic.
- **"… is not in this Telegram account's chat list".** Your Telegram account left the group, was removed, or a paid group's time ran out. Join it again in Telegram. An archived chat shows the same note and still works.
- **"Your Telegram account can no longer read this chat".** Join the group again in Telegram, then press "Try again" on the listener in the Desk. The app also asks again by itself every ten minutes.
- **"Telegram would not open this chat", "This is not a channel or a group", "This is not a chat the app can read".** The handle changed, the group is private, or the wrong chat was typed. Pick the group again with "Choose…".
- **A dry run will not start.** Its message says what is missing: "Switch this listener on first", "Switch trading on first", "Connect Telegram first", "Log in to your broker in MetaTrader first", "Dry runs need an active subscription." or "Dry run not started: this month's limit of 15 dry runs is reached." (with your plan's number)
- **The dry run says every symbol is unknown.** MetaTrader was not logged in to your broker. Log in, wait until the account shows as connected, and run it again.
- **"no price history in the terminal to replay against".** MetaTrader has no history for that moment. Open the symbol's five-minute chart in MetaTrader and scroll back so it downloads, then run again.
- **I cannot find my dry run in Activity.** Dry-run results are tests. They are in the listener's "Dry runs" window and under "Tests (dry runs)" in Signals.