Your first strategy, step by step
9. Grid strategy for a visual guide to the builder and preview.
This walkthrough takes you from a fresh login to a running strategy. It uses a Grid as the example because it exercises every part of the app; the other strategies follow the same shape.
1. Sign in
Connect your browser wallet and sign the login message. The dashboard opens with a four-step welcome tour: Overview, How it works, Your wallets, and Safety. The Safety step includes an interactive demo of the Pause All button.
2. Create a strategy wallet
Automated strategies do not trade from your browser wallet. They trade from a strategy wallet, a separate wallet whose key is generated and stored in your browser. Go to Wallets and click Generate. Give it a label. You can create up to 20.
Before funding it, export the wallet. Use Back up to download its key file and save it in a secure location on your device. If you lose the browser profile and the key file, the funds in that wallet are unrecoverable. See Wallets in Surge.
3. Fund the strategy wallet
Click Fund on the wallet. Choose how much ADA (and, if the strategy sells a token, how many tokens) to send from your browser wallet. Your browser wallet asks you to confirm. A "funding settling" banner shows for about two minutes while the transaction lands.
How much to send: every strategy builder has a Required balance panel that adds up the trade budget, the DEX order deposits, batcher fees, network fees and Surge fees. Send at least that. Keep a few extra ADA on top; a wallet with less than about 10–12 ADA of spare ADA cannot pay for its next order and the strategy pauses.
4. Open the builder
Click New strategy in the sidebar or on the dashboard and choose Grid. The builder is a two-column form: your inputs on the left, a live preview on the right.
5. Fill in the form
For a grid:
Trading pair — pick a token. Only ADA pairs are supported. Verified tokens show a badge.
DEX — Surge lists only the DEX's that have a pool for that pair.
Total investment — the ADA the grid may use. Max fills in your strategy wallet's balance.
Price range — either absolute prices or a ± percentage around the current price. Suggest proposes a range from the last 7, 30 or 180 days of prices.
Grid count — how many rungs. The slider's maximum is what the pool can support; the preview also shows a recommended count.
Slippage tolerance — default 0.5%.
Co-sign wallet — pick the strategy wallet you funded (or generate one here).
Tick the risk acknowledgement.
The preview updates as you type. Deploy is enabled only when the preview says the grid is launchable — if not, it lists exactly what is blocking it (for example "investment below minimum" or "price outside the range"). Every field is explained on the Grid page.
6. Deploy
Click Create. Surge saves the strategy, and the strategy's detail page opens. If your wallet does not yet hold the required balance, a funding prompt appears.
7. Watch it run
The detail page has tabs for Overview (status, P&L, chart), Rungs (each price level and its state), Trade log, Linked wallet and Configuration. The header status badge tells you whether the strategy is running or why it is paused.
When a rung fires, your browser checks the transaction against the guard and signs it automatically. Automate signing is on by default, so you do not need to be at the keyboard. Turn it off in Settings → General if you want to approve every trade. See Signing and approvals.
8. Keep the tab open
Surge trades only while this tab is open and connected. Turn on Keep screen awake in Settings if you want to leave the laptop unattended, and watch the socket pill in the header. See How non-custodial works.
9. Stop, archive, or delete
Use the strategy header to pause or stop. A stopped strategy can be archived (kept read-only in the Archived list) or deleted. Funds stay in the strategy wallet either way; move them back with Send or Sweep on the Wallets page. See Managing strategies.
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