Copy Trading on Padre: How Automations Work
Padre calls it Automations, and it does one thing: mirrors another wallet’s trades with yours, without you being present. This is how it is configured, what each setting actually controls, and the part of the risk that copying does not remove.
Setting one up
Automations live at trade.padre.gg/automations. New Automation opens a short form, and every field in it is a risk decision rather than a preference:
| Field | What it controls |
|---|---|
| Chain | Ethereum, Base, BSC or Solana — one chain per automation |
| Wallet | Which of your wallets funds the copied trades; its balance is shown as you choose |
| Target Address | The wallet you are mirroring |
| Max Buy | The ceiling in USD on each copied buy |
| Copy Sells | Mirrors their sells in the same proportional amount |
| Copy Quotes | Extends copying to USDC, USDT and DAI pairs |
Start copy trade activates it. Afterwards the automation appears in the Automations tab showing both wallets, the buy and sell settings, and controls to modify or delete it. Since each automation is one wallet on one chain, following a multi-chain trader means one automation per chain, each with its own cap. Wallets are per-chain on Padre anyway — how that works is worth reading first if you have not set one up.
Max Buy is the whole safety model
It is worth being precise about this because the wording is easy to skim: Max Buy is the maximum USD spent per buy transaction. It is an absolute ceiling of yours, not a percentage of what the target spent.
That is the right design. A wallet with 400 ETH taking a position sized to its balance would wipe out a small follower if copying were proportional. With an absolute cap, their conviction trade becomes your fixed-size trade. The flip side: a wallet that makes forty small trades a day will fire forty trades at your cap, and the fees land on each one. Set the cap against what the wallet actually does, not against what you can afford once.
Copy Sells off is a different strategy than you think
With Copy Sells disabled you mirror the entry and own the exit. People leave it off meaning to keep control, then discover they have taken on a stranger’s token selection while keeping their own exit discipline — which is the half of the trade most people are worse at.
If you are copying because you trust the wallet’s judgement, enable Copy Sells or attach exits to the position yourself. The exit mechanics, including stop-loss and trailing stop, are on the order types page.
What copying does not remove
Copy trading moves the decision, not the risk. Four things come with the package:
- Delay. You transact after they do. On a token moving fast, the price you get is not the price they got, and the gap is widest on exactly the trades that looked best.
- Their judgement, including the bad days. A wallet selected because of a good month is a wallet selected on a small sample.
- Being a known follower. A wallet with copiers can be traded against deliberately — buy, wait for the mirrors, sell into them. Public performance attracts both admiration and that.
- Your own costs. Gas, priority fees and slippage apply to every copied trade and they are yours, not split. What a trade actually costs covers the layers, and the portfolio view is where you find out what copying actually returned.
None of that argues against using it. It argues for treating a target wallet the way you would treat any position: sized deliberately, reviewed, and switched off when the reason you chose it stops being true.
Copy trading is one mode; the Padre bot guide covers trading it yourself.
Copy trading on Padre — questions
Does Padre have copy trading?
Yes, under Automations at trade.padre.gg/automations. You create an automation, give it a target wallet address, and your wallet mirrors that wallet’s buys on the chain you selected.
Which chains can I copy trade on?
The chain is chosen when you create the automation, from the ones Padre supports — Ethereum, Base, BSC and Solana. One automation covers one chain and one target wallet, so following the same trader across two chains means two automations.
Can I cap how much each copied trade spends?
Yes, and this is the setting that matters most. Max Buy sets the maximum USD spent per buy transaction. It is your limit, not a proportion of theirs — so a wallet that fires a very large buy does not drag your whole balance in behind it.
Does it copy their sells too?
Only if you enable Copy Sells, which mirrors their sell in the same proportional amount. Leaving it off means you enter with them and exit entirely on your own judgement, which is a different strategy than most people think they are signing up for.
What is Copy Quotes?
It extends copying to trades denominated in quote currencies such as USDC, USDT or DAI, rather than only the chain’s native asset. Useful when the wallet you follow trades stable pairs.
What does copy trading not protect me from?
Everything that makes the original trade bad. You inherit their entry timing minus a delay, their token choice, and their mistakes — and you are a known follower, which is exactly what a wallet running a deliberate exit against copiers is counting on. Copying removes the work of deciding, not the risk of being wrong.
Automation fields, chain list and copy settings are as published in Padre’s own app guide, archived 12 July 2025, since that documentation site went offline in September 2026. Nothing here is trading advice, and no performance claim is made about any wallet.