Setup guide

Get your free Alpaca paper keys.

Vrot trades through Alpaca, a US broker with a free practice account. Here’s how to get the two keys the app asks for. It takes about five minutes.

Step by step

Make a free Alpaca account
Go to alpaca.markets and sign up with your email. A paper (practice) account comes with it, with pretend money. You don’t need to fund anything.
Open your paper account
Log in at app.alpaca.markets. In the account switcher at the top left, pick the one marked Paper. Paper account numbers start with PA.
Make API keys
On the paper account’s home page, find API Keys and choose Generate New Keys. Alpaca shows a Key ID (it starts with PK) and a Secret Key.
Copy both right away
Alpaca shows the secret only once. If you lose it, make new keys; the old ones stop working.
Paste them into Vrot
Open Vrot, go to Settings, step 2, paste both and choose Check and save. Vrot checks them with Alpaca and keeps them on your computer only.

Alpaca may change its pages. If a button has moved, look for “API Keys” on your paper account’s home page. Vrot AI isn’t affiliated with Alpaca.

If it doesn’t work

“Alpaca refused your keys”
The keys were copied with a missing character, or they were replaced. Make new keys and paste them again.
“That’s a live key”
You copied keys from the real-money account. Switch to Paper first, then make keys there.
Can’t reach Alpaca
Check the internet. Vrot keeps trying by itself and tells you when it’s working again.
Reset your paper account
Alpaca lets you reset it. Afterwards, make new keys and paste them into Vrot.

Download Vrot and paste them in. It starts on paper.