The decision before the file
Exness MT5 download for PC: the choice that is made before the installer
Fetching MetaTrader 5 is the visible end of a decision taken earlier and somewhere else — inside the Personal Area on exness.com, at the moment a trading account was created. Two things are settled there in one click and never afterwards: which platform the account belongs to, and which pricing type it carries. Get that click right and the installer is a formality; get it wrong and the terminal refuses a perfectly valid account.
One click, two settings
Opening a trading account settles the platform and the type together
Registration produces the Personal Area, and the Personal Area produces trading accounts. When one of those accounts is created, two properties are attached to it at once: the platform it will run on — MetaTrader 4 or MetaTrader 5 — and the account type that fixes its pricing model. The account then works on that platform only.
The platform half is the one this page turns on, because it decides which installer is the right installer. The type half is worth naming in the same breath for the opposite reason: it looks like the harder decision and is in fact the reversible one.
Five types stand in two families. Standard and Standard Cent are spread-only — the charge lives inside the spread, the small gap between the buy and the sell price — and neither sets a minimum deposit; on a Cent account the balance is counted in cents of the account currency, so very small real trades are possible. Pro, Raw Spread, and Zero form the professional tier with a higher minimum set by region and published on the official Exness website, and the last two take a commission per lot — a lot being a standard trade size — instead of a wider spread. Separate from either arrangement, a swap is the overnight-holding fee charged when a position is still open after the end of the trading day.
Every line of that paragraph is chosen at account level and none of it is fixed forever: a further trading account of another type opens alongside the first whenever it is wanted. The five types compared → So the sequence has exactly one irreversible junction in it, and it stands two steps ahead of the download.
Where the answer is displayed afterwards
The platform is printed beside the account in the Personal Area, together with the account number and the server name. Nothing has to be remembered from the day the account was opened — it only has to be read before the file is fetched rather than after.
The same three details arrive by email at the moment the account is created, which is the second reason the registration address is worth keeping reachable.
A correct sequence makes a setup shorter, not safer in market terms. Trading is risky and may not be suitable for everyone.
The refusal explained
Why an MT4 account will never sign in to MetaTrader 5
This is the single most expensive thing to discover after a download rather than before it, and the reason it is expensive is that the terminal cannot tell the person what is really wrong. It sees three fields and rejects them.
What is actually happening at that screen
- The account is bound to one terminal, from birth. The platform was attached when the account was created and is not swapped afterwards. MetaTrader 5 is being handed credentials that belong to a different platform entirely, and there is no version of the number, the password, or the server name that makes them fit.
- The rejection is worded like a password problem. Nothing on the screen says “this is an MT4 account”. It reads as invalid details, which sends the search off in the wrong direction — retyping, resetting, re-reading the server list — while the actual answer is one line in the Personal Area beside the account.
- The repair is a new account, not a new registration. A trading account on MT5 is opened inside the same Personal Area, under the same verified identity, alongside whatever already exists. Nothing has to be signed up for twice and no identity check is repeated. It issues its own number, its own server name, and its own trading password.
- The answer is one line, not a diagnosis. Beside every account in the Personal Area sits the name of the platform it belongs to. Reading that line takes a second and ends the question; retyping the number, resetting the password, and scrolling the server list can absorb an evening and end nowhere, because none of the three is what the screen is actually objecting to.
- The mirror image is equally true. An MT5 account will not open MetaTrader 4 either. The rule is not about which terminal is newer; it is that the account and the platform are one unit, decided at creation. The preparation for the older terminal is set out on the MT4 page.
What has to be settled when
Decided before the download, and safely decided after it
Preparation is only useful if it stops at the right place. Half of what feels like a prerequisite is nothing of the kind, and treating the whole list as urgent is its own way of stalling a setup.
| BEFORE Settle it first |
AFTER Safe to postpone |
|
|---|---|---|
| Platform of the trading account | Yes — it is fixed at creation and decides which installer is the right one | — |
| Account number and server name | Yes — the first screen of the terminal asks for both, and both sit in the Personal Area | — |
| Trading password | Yes — it is set when the account is created and reset only in the Personal Area | — |
| Account type and pricing model | — | A further trading account of another type opens alongside the first one whenever it is wanted |
| Funding the account | — | Nothing up to and including the first sign-in needs a deposit; the demo runs at the same prices |
| Which instruments to trade | — | Entirely separate from the sequence and from the choice of file |
| Identity verification | Worth starting early — it runs at its own pace inside the Personal Area | Does not stand between anyone and the installer |
Swipe the table sideways →
Read down the left-hand column and the preparation shrinks to four lines, three of which are simply written down from one screen of the Personal Area.
One visit, three answers
Three questions to answer in the Personal Area, in this order
Does a trading account exist at all?
Registration creates the dashboard, not something to trade with. If the account list is empty, the download has nothing waiting behind it and the next move is to open an account rather than to fetch a file.
Which platform does it say beside it?
MT5 means the installer on this page. MT4 means the other one, or a further account opened on MT5 in the same place. This is the answer that decides everything and it takes one glance.
What are the number and the server name?
Both are displayed beside the account. Written down while that page is open, they turn the first screen of the terminal into typing rather than a second sign-in to look something up.
Only after those three does the file matter. The MT5 installer is published on the official exness.com and downloads without any login, and the same links are listed inside the Personal Area — where the three answers were just collected, so the trip is free. Files offered by other websites should not be trusted. The whole route map by device is on the download page.
A note on the machine
The machine is a smaller question than it looks — with one asymmetry
MT5 does not force a Windows machine
Official MetaTrader 5 packages for macOS and Linux are published by the platform developer alongside the Windows one, and the browser route needs no installed file at all: the Web Terminal runs a full session in a tab and works with MT5-based accounts. None of that changes the preparation — the same account, number, password, and server are still what opens it.
The asymmetry that belongs to step two
MetaTrader 4 desktop is built for Windows only. That single line turns the platform choice at account creation into a decision with consequences on a machine running something else, which is exactly why it belongs at the account step and not at the download step. Deciding it in the right order costs a glance; deciding it in the wrong order costs a second account.
Platform capabilities and supported systems follow what the platform developer and Exness publish and may change with new releases.
Quick answers
Deciding before the MT5 download — frequently asked questions
Which decision has to be made before the MT5 installer is fetched?
The platform of the trading account. It is attached when the account is created in the Personal Area, alongside the account type, and the account then works on that platform only. Everything else on a preparation list — the pricing type, the funding, the instruments — can be settled afterwards without repeating anything.
Can an MT4 account be switched over to MT5 instead of opening a new one?
No. The platform is part of the account from the moment it is created and is not swapped later. What replaces a switch is a further trading account opened on MT5 in the same Personal Area — same identity, no second registration, no repeated identity check, and its own number, server name, and trading password.
Why does the MT5 terminal reject an account that is definitely correct?
Because the terminal has no way to say what is really wrong. If the account was opened on MT4, its details are valid and simply belong somewhere else, and the screen reports that as invalid credentials. Checking the platform beside the account in the Personal Area answers in one line what retyping never will.
Does the account type have to be chosen before downloading MT5?
It is chosen at the same moment as the platform, but it does not gate the download the way the platform does. Standard and Standard Cent take any starting amount; Pro, Raw Spread, and Zero carry a regional minimum shown on the official Exness website. A further account of another type can be opened later and used alongside, so this half of the decision stays open.
What is the practical difference between the spread-only and commission families?
Where the charge sits. On Standard and Standard Cent it lives inside the spread, the small gap between the buy and the sell price. On Raw Spread and Zero it is taken as a commission per lot — a lot being a standard trade size — with a raw or zero spread alongside it. A swap, the overnight-holding fee on a position still open past the end of the trading day, is separate from both and unaffected by the choice.
Does a Cent account run on a different terminal?
No. Standard Cent is a pricing arrangement, not a platform: balances are counted in cents of the account currency, which makes very small real trades possible, and the account still belongs to MT4 or MT5 exactly like any other. The platform beside it in the Personal Area remains the only line that decides which installer is fetched.
Where is the platform of an existing account displayed?
Beside the account in the Personal Area, together with the account number and the server name — the two other items the first screen of the terminal will ask for. The same three details were also emailed at the moment the account was created.
Is a login needed to download the MT5 installer?
No, and that is the trap the ordering solves. The file is published openly on the official exness.com and nothing checks whether a matching account exists behind it. The links inside the Personal Area lead to the same place, with the advantage of putting the platform question in front of the eyes at the right moment.
Can the whole decision be tested without money?
Yes. A demo account on MT5 with virtual funds opens in the Personal Area before any deposit and quotes the same market prices. It issues a real account number, server name, and trading password, so the question of whether this terminal accepts this account is answered at no cost.
What still has to be prepared once the platform question is settled?
Three items and nothing else: the account number, the server name, and the trading password set when the account was created. The first two are on display in the Personal Area; the third is stored nowhere and is reset there if it is lost. The order for the sign-in itself is on the login page.
Is there a minimum deposit attached to the choice made at that step?
It depends on the family rather than on the platform. Standard and Standard Cent set no minimum, so a real account there can be funded with any amount once it exists. Pro, Raw Spread, and Zero carry a higher minimum that varies by region, with the current figure published on the official Exness website and shown in the Personal Area. Neither figure has any bearing on fetching the installer.
Which documents should be to hand for the identity check?
Whatever the check itself asks for — the accepted list is displayed inside the Personal Area on the screen that requests it, so nothing has to be guessed in advance. What is worth arranging in advance is the timing: the check runs at its own pace, shows what is still outstanding, and is far more comfortable to start on a quiet evening than to remember in the middle of a setup.
Does an unverified identity block the MT5 download?
No. Verification is submitted inside the Personal Area and runs at its own pace, with its status shown there; the installer does not consult it. It belongs early in the sequence for practical reasons rather than technical ones — it is the step that waits on nobody once it has been started, and the step most often remembered too late.
The junction is two steps before the installer
Everything on this page traces back to one screen on the official Exness website: an email address and a short questionnaire create the Personal Area, identity verification follows inside it, and opening a trading account attaches the platform and the type. Choose MT5 there and the terminal from this page signs straight in. See what each registration step produces →
Open Exness AccountSequencing is the whole job of this page. Sign-up forms, dashboards, trading accounts, and the platform written beside each one are held by Exness on its own website, which is where the partner route above leads.