Forex orders are designed to manage your trading for you, allowing you time free to work on other projects.  They work by sending requests to your broker as soon as the market researches specified conditions, buying, selling or closing out your position on your behalf. 

There are several are types of Forex orders, that will deal with the basic aspects of trading. 

Market orders are straightforward, and send a request to buy or sell currencies at the current market prices. 

Limit orders can be useful for managing strict trading projects. They are used to request buying and selling at specific prices, and/or at specific times. For example you can set up a limit order to sell your currencies when the market reaches specific conditions, such as when it has risen by 50 pips.  Or you can specify a limit order to close out your position at certain times, regardless of whether the market has risen or fallen. 

A stop-loss order can be used to monitor and react when a market moves against your position.  This order will close your trade when it reaches certain unfavourable conditions to limit your losses.

Order Cancels Other (OCO) is a little more complicated, and covers more than one market, limit or stop-loss order, or a combination of the three.  This can be used to manage trade more effectively, as you can specify that an OCO closes your position out, if the market drops below a particular point, and also specify at the same time that your trade is sold if the market rises to a certain level – the one cancelling out the other. 

There are other types of Forex orders that can manage your trades down to the fine details, but the market, limit and stop-loss orders cover the essentials, and can prevent you from losing out when the market moves against you, and can also help you take advantage of any sudden highs.

The added protection of Forex orders is especially important in the volatile currency market, as in some extreme cases the market can drop so suddenly that you may not just lose all the money in your account, but you may also find yourself in a position negative equity.