Trade Ideas Review 2026: Is Holly AI Worth It?

Trade Ideas is a real-time stock scanner for active US traders, built around a Windows desktop app and an AI engine called Holly that surfaces intraday trade candidates. As of October 3, 2026 it costs $127 a month for TI Standard and $254 a month for TI Premium, the plan that includes Holly, or $89 and $178 a month on annual billing. It is a powerful tool for its niche, with one of the strictest refund policies in the category.

How this Trade Ideas review was evaluated

This is a documentary review, based on the public product pages, pricing and documentation. Prices and plan features were read on trade-ideas.com/pricing on October 3, 2026, the refund terms on its billing policy (effective September 14, 2026), platform details on its download page, and market coverage in its user guide. Ratings come from Trade Ideas' public Trustpilot page on the same date. Signal performance figures in marketing and testimonials are treated as vendor claims, not as evidence of typical results.

What Trade Ideas is, and what it costs

Trade Ideas is a market scanner. According to its user guide, its servers monitor every tick on the NASDAQ, AMEX, NYSE, OTC and Pink Sheets markets and on Canadian markets, and turn that flow into customizable scans, alerts and screeners. On top of the scanner sit charts, a real-time paper trading simulator, in-app trading through supported brokers, and, on the Premium plan, the Holly AI signals, backtesting and auto trading.

Source: Trade Ideas pricing page, read October 3, 2026. Trade Ideas pays market data exchange fees for non-professional users; professional traders pay their own exchange fees. A free account signup exists, but its limits are not quantified on the signup page.

How Holly AI works

Holly is Trade Ideas' AI engine. Trade Ideas describes it as a virtual trading assistant that uses dozens of strategies, each built to recognize patterns, anomalies or market conditions that have historically preceded moves, and that surfaces entry and exit candidates in real time during the session.

The published strategy list is useful reading because it is specific. Strategies have names like Breakout, Bullish Pullback, Power Hour Long and Horseshoe Up, and each one combines a trigger (a resistance break, an opening range breakdown, a 25% pullback from highs) with filters on price, volume, float and the S&P 500's short-term direction. Many of them are restricted to lower-priced stocks: several only scan stocks under $20, and some under $5 or $8. Short-side strategies are included alongside long ones.

Two practical consequences follow. First, Holly is an intraday, active-session tool: its candidates come with targets, hold times and stop types meant to be acted on quickly. Second, a candidate means a setup resembles ones that historically behaved a certain way, not that this trade will work. Trade Ideas' own disclosure says it is a publisher, that nothing it publishes is a personal recommendation, and that past results do not indicate future performance.

What Trade Ideas does well

Real-time scanning depth. Customizable scans and screeners across 500+ data points, on every tick of the US and Canadian markets, are the core of the product and the reason serious day traders use it. Few retail tools let you define "what I am looking for" this precisely and watch for it live.

Holly's strategies are documented. Instead of a black box that says "AI", Trade Ideas publishes what each Holly strategy looks for. You can disagree with a strategy, but you can read it, which is more than many AI signal products offer.

Practice before risking money. The real-time paper trading simulator is included from the Standard plan, and backtesting is on Premium. Testing a scan or a strategy before trading it is the right order of operations.

Broker integrations. Trade Ideas lists API integrations with TradeStation, Interactive Brokers, E*TRADE and Alpaca, plus partner access with Moomoo, Centerpoint Securities and Cobra Trading, so you can trade from the platform. Auto trading is a Premium feature.

Support has a good reputation. Responsive, knowledgeable support is one of the most praised themes in public reviews, along with the scanning engine itself.

Where Trade Ideas stops: refunds, platform, cost

All sales are final. The billing policy is unambiguous: no refund is payable on a paid invoice. Cancelling stops the next renewal, and access continues to the end of the period already paid. Annual plans are not refunded or prorated. Promotional purchases are final. Non-use, change of mind, trading losses and dissatisfaction with signals are all listed as grounds that do not give rise to a refund. Billing errors are corrected if reported within 60 days.

Holly is the expensive plan. The AI signals that drive most of the interest are on TI Premium, $254 a month or $2,136 a year. TI Standard is a scanner without Holly.

Windows first. Trade Ideas Pro is a Windows desktop application. Mac users are pointed to virtualization (Parallels Desktop) or a cloud Windows machine, with a web access version linked from the site. If you work on a Mac or mostly on your phone, test that setup before committing.

US and Canadian stocks only. The scanner covers US exchanges, OTC markets and Canadian markets. It is not a forex, futures or crypto tool. For US equity day traders that is fine; for anyone else it is disqualifying.

A steep learning curve. Trustpilot reviewers, positive and negative, describe a tool that takes time to configure and is not a beginner's product.

What users say about Trade Ideas

As of October 3, 2026, Trade Ideas' Trustpilot page shows a TrustScore of 3.8 out of 5 from 46 reviews, a small sample. Positive reviews praise the scanning engine, the depth of customization and the support team. Negative reviews cite an interface they consider dated or slow to load, disappointment with the results of AI-generated trades, the learning curve, and billing and refund friction.

Read the signal complaints with the same caution as the testimonials: both are individual experiences, not measured results. What the pattern does show is that buyers who expected Holly to be a hands-off profit engine were the most disappointed, which matches the vendor's own disclosure that it is not one.

Who Trade Ideas fits, and who should skip it

Best for: active US stock day traders, at the screen during market hours, who want a fast, deeply customizable real-time scanner and are comfortable on Windows. Premium suits traders who want Holly's intraday candidates, backtesting and auto trading, and who will filter those candidates through their own rules.

Who should skip it: swing traders and part-time traders who cannot act on intraday alerts, Mac-only users who do not want to run Windows, beginners, anyone trading forex, futures or crypto, and anyone who wants the option to get a refund. If you mainly trade options on SPY, QQQ or a few large caps and want to understand the chart you are looking at, a live small-cap scanner solves a different problem.

Trade Ideas vs Bullynx

These are different categories of tool, and this table is meant to make that obvious rather than to declare a winner. Bullynx is our product.

What Bullynx does differently. Trade Ideas answers "what should I look at?". Bullynx answers "what does this chart say?". You upload a screenshot from thinkorswim, Webull, Robinhood, Schwab, TradingView or a broker app, and get a structured read with both scenarios and the level that would invalidate them. Lynx, the chat on Pro and Elite, lets you push back on that read and remembers your profile and strategy. The AI chart analysis page shows the full output, and the AI stock chart analysis page shows it on stock charts specifically.

What Bullynx does not do that Trade Ideas does. No market scanning, no live alerts, no intraday signal feed, no backtesting, no paper trading, no auto trading, no broker connection. If you need a live list of candidates during the session, Bullynx does not replace Trade Ideas. Some traders use a scanner to find a setup and a chart read to stress-test it; that is the only sense in which these tools fit together.

How Trade Ideas compares with the alternatives

• If the price or the refund policy is the deal-breaker, our Trade Ideas alternatives guide sorts cheaper scanners and analysis tools by what they actually replace.
• If you want automated charting and backtesting across more asset classes, read our TrendSpider review.
• If you are weighing an AI that acts for you against one that only analyzes, AI trading bots vs AI assistants covers the risk trade-off.
• If you are new to intraday trading, day trading for beginners explains why the filter you apply to signals matters more than the feed.
• For the wider landscape, see the best AI trading tools comparison.

Verdict: is Trade Ideas worth it?

Trade Ideas is a legitimate, long-running and genuinely capable real-time scanner, and Holly's strategies are more transparent than most AI signal products. For a US stock day trader who is at the screen every session and will configure the tool properly, it is one of the reference products in its category.

The friction is commercial and practical. Holly costs $254 a month, the desktop app is Windows-first, the scanner covers US and Canadian stocks only, and the billing policy makes every payment final. If you trade part-time, swing trade, work on a Mac, or want to understand charts rather than receive a stream of candidates, the value case is weaker. If you do try it, start with a single month rather than an annual plan, since annual subscriptions are not prorated or refunded.

Educational only. Not financial advice. DYOR.