{"id":853,"date":"2012-11-23T22:03:32","date_gmt":"2012-11-24T04:03:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/priceactiontradingsystem.com\/?p=853"},"modified":"2026-09-02T12:22:39","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T17:22:39","slug":"facts-about-tick-charts-and-how-they-help-improve-price-action-trading","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/priceactiontradingsystem.com\/facts-about-tick-charts-and-how-they-help-improve-price-action-trading\/","title":{"rendered":"Facts About Tick Charts And How They Help Improve Price Action Trading"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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When trading any market, particularly the ES, we prefer to use tick charts over time based charts. \u00a0For this reason, we want to share with you the facts about tick charts and how they help improve price action trading<\/strong> results. \u00a0The most important reason we prefer tick charts is because they allows us another window into the price action. \u00a0In other words, it allows us to see the price action patterns with increased details. \u00a0We already believe that price action is the key to successful trading, and it always helps to use the best tools for any job, and it’s our opinion that tick charts give us the best tool for price action trading.<\/p>

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\"Trading<\/a>
Trading Tick Charts
(stanford.edu)<\/figcaption><\/figure>

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There are a few interesting details that you must know about tick charts though, and one of them that we are asked almost daily by other traders is why their tick charts don’t look exactly like our tick charts. \u00a0What you must understand is that because of the way tick charts work, which is simply counting every trade as a tick, that no tick two charts will ever look exactly alike, particularly the bars.<\/p>

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You should be able to get your overall chart patterns and lay outs to look very similar, but it might also take a different tick count chart size, because not all data providers count ticks in the same way either. \u00a0Tick charts are an in exact tool from data provider to data provider, so make sure that you understand that so that you do not drive yourself nuts wondering why your tick chart may not look like one of mine, even though you are using the exact same size tick chart.<\/p>

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What we try to do when we look for the proper tick size chart to trade for any market is to open up a 5 minute time chart first. \u00a0We then open up different tick size charts until we find one that resembles the 5 minute chart, in regards to patterns, as closely as possible. \u00a0Once we find the best fit, that’s the size tick chart we will trade each day in that particular market. \u00a0Even though our tick chart is trying to mimic a 5 minute chart, the tick chart will still give us many more details about what’s going on with prices, and the more details we have, the better odds we have at reading the price action properly. \u00a0Just remember, if your tick chart bars look different than ours, then that’s OK, as long as your patterns compare closely. \u00a0If your patterns do not look the same, experiment with different size tick charts until you can find a very close match and go with that. \u00a0There are many different reasons we choose a 5 minute chart as well, but we won’t go into that in this article.<\/p>

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There are obviously other differences between tick and time based charts, but we have already discussed the important ones. \u00a0Below is an article we found on tick charts at www.topdogtrading.com. \u00a0Continue reading to see what this author had to say about tick charts in the excerpts we included below.<\/p>

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As to the difference between tick charts and minute charts, that\u2019s going to take a little more explanation.<\/p>

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On most charts, each bar represents a period of time.<\/p>

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