Alpaca gives you orders and fills. It does not tell you what a trade made, what it really cost, or which orders quietly failed. Logbook works that out on your device.
WHAT A TRADE MADE
Alpaca returns orders and fills, not results. A buy and a sell come back as two unrelated rows, and pairing them is left to you. Logbook does that pairing on your device — first in, first out, per symbol, using Alpaca's own position intent so a short closed lower reads correctly as a win.
Every trade shows what it rode on and what it returned. A 90 dollar loss means nothing until you know it was staked on 24,700 — which makes it a scratch, not a disaster.
THE ORDERS THAT NEVER FILLED
An order can be submitted, accepted, and then expire without ever trading. If it was the exit on an open position, that position is still open. On a strategy meant to be flat overnight, that is a real loss sitting somewhere nobody looks. Logbook lists them separately: still working, and ended without filling.
FEES INCLUDED, BECAUSE THEY CHANGE THE ANSWER
Alpaca charges no commission on equities, which is not the same as free. It passes on SEC, FINRA and CAT fees, billed per day, on an endpoint the orders API never mentions. A total computed from orders alone is always slightly flattering. Logbook fetches them, itemises each charge under the day it belongs to, and shows a net figure that reconciles with your balance.
WHAT YOU GET
• Book — equity, cash, buying power, and every open position with its size and return
• History — closed trades with realised P&L, each fee itemised, filtered by period or a custom date range
• Charts — the equity curve after fees, results by instrument, and how long positions were actually held
• Markets — what you hold and trade, with last prices, the US market clock in your own timezone, and your own exits marked on each price chart
• Several accounts — paper and live side by side, each with its own keys, switching instantly
• Home-screen widget — equity, the day's change, and whether anything is outstanding
READ-ONLY, BY CONSTRUCTION
Logbook cannot place, modify or cancel an order. Not as a setting — the code that would do it does not exist. It is a viewer for accounts traded by something else, whether that is you or a strategy you run.
YOUR KEYS STAY YOURS
API keys are verified once against Alpaca and then stored encrypted on your device, in storage backed by the Android Keystore. There is no Logbook account, no server of ours, and no analytics in the app. Nothing is transmitted anywhere except to Alpaca's own API under your own credentials.
PRICING
Free for three days, everything included. After that a single 4.99 purchase unlocks the app permanently. No subscription, no account.
BEFORE YOU START
You need an Alpaca brokerage account, paper or live, and an API key pair from your Alpaca dashboard. Prices come from Alpaca under your own data plan; on the free plan that is the IEX feed, a fraction of consolidated volume rather than the full tape, and Logbook labels it that way.
Logbook is an independent client for the Alpaca API. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Alpaca Securities LLC or Alpaca Markets. It displays information from your own account and does not provide investment advice.
For Alpaca: realised P&L per trade, regulatory fees, and unfilled orders.