An iron condor has four legs, two short strikes, a credit, and two ways to lose. That makes it one of the easiest strategies to trade on autopilot and one of the hardest to review honestly. A good journal turns a pile of fills into clear answers about what’s working.
A quick refresher on the structure
An iron condor combines a short put spread below the market and a short call spread above it, usually in the same expiration. You collect a net credit when you open it.
- Maximum profit is the net credit you collect, if the underlying finishes between the short strikes.
- Maximum loss is the width of the wider spread minus the credit, times 100 per contract.
- Breakevens are the short put strike minus the credit, and the short call strike plus the credit.
What to record for every condor
Most brokers export each leg as a separate fill. Your journal should group them back into one trade, then capture:
| Field | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| All four strikes and the expiration | Lets you compare how wide and how far out of the money you trade over time |
| Net credit and width of each side | Sets your risk, reward, and breakeven win rate |
| Entry time | Time of day is one of the strongest patterns in short-dated condors |
| Exit type: closed early, held, or expired | Shows whether your exits help or hurt |
| Exit price and P&L after fees | Four legs means fees add up faster than on a single option |
| Adjustments or legs closed separately | A condor that becomes a single spread is a different trade |
| A short note and a tag or two | Your reason for the trade, and how you felt, are the context numbers can’t give you |
The numbers that matter in review
Because the maximum loss is usually several times the credit, win rate alone tells you very little. Look at these together:
- Breakeven win rate. If your average win is $90 and your average loss is $260, you need to win 260 ÷ (90 + 260) ≈ 74% of trades just to break even.
- Average loss versus average win. A few full losses can erase weeks of small wins. Track how often you take the maximum loss.
- Results by entry time and weekday. Condors opened in the first hour, or on data-release days, often behave differently.
- Closed early versus held. Compare the average result of each exit style using your own trades.
A simple weekly review
- Sort the week’s condors from worst to best.
- For the three worst, note what they had in common: entry time, distance from the money, size, or a skipped exit.
- Check whether any losses came from breaking a rule you already set, like a maximum loss per trade.
- Write one process change to try next week, such as “no new condors before 10:00.”
Put your trades on the record
Import your broker CSV and see every multi-leg trade grouped, your patterns, and your key findings. Free during early access.
Start freeThis guide is for education only and isn’t investment advice. Options involve significant risk and aren’t suitable for every investor. Examples are hypothetical.