A critical question for any trading tool: what keeps running when your laptop is closed? NoVo runs in the cloud — server-side, not on your computer — so it keeps reading the tape and managing your positions even if your device is off, asleep, or your wifi drops. Here's the honest scope of that.
What server-side means for you
Because NoVo's engine lives on hosted infrastructure, it isn't dependent on your device. Once you're in a trade, the position management — the stop, the exit ladder — runs on the server and at your broker, so your laptop dying or your phone losing signal doesn't leave a position unmanaged. The tape keeps being read and your open trade keeps being handled regardless of what your device is doing. That's a real reliability advantage over anything that runs locally in a browser tab that can crash.
The extra layer: broker-side stops
There's a second layer of protection — on Tradier: the protective stop is placed at your broker, resting at the exchange, so even in the extreme case (NoVo's server and your device both offline) it's still live at the broker, independent of NoVo entirely. On Alpaca, which has no broker-side stops for options, NoVo enforces the stop in software — so a full NoVo outage is a real gap there, and Tradier is the sturdier choice for fully hands-off live trading.
If closing your laptop can leave a live options position unmanaged, that's not a tool — it's a liability. NoVo runs server-side so your risk is handled whether you're watching or not.
The honest caveats
What still depends on you: entering a trade requires you to be there to click — NoVo never enters on its own, so server-side management covers open positions, not making new decisions while you're away. And no system is immune to an outage; on Tradier the broker-side stop is an independent backstop, while on Alpaca the stop is software-enforced and pauses with NoVo. NoVo is honest about this: server-side is a genuine reliability gain, not a claim that nothing can ever go wrong.