Which Time frame is best ? and why not to use the 1 minute time frame on chart?

Hello

I personaly dont know why most traders open many time frames infront of them at the exact same time … is there an advantage of doing so:(… please tell me if you have benefit from looking at many charts for same pair at the same time…

Thank you

The 1minutes chart is too difficult to trade on as the price whips around alot if your really good you could trade it but I can’t and would suggest you stay away from it as a newbie like me: )

Some strategies use multiple timeframes for example you might use the H1 and H4 for confirmation of a trade then enter on the M15 If the rules say so but but all strategies work this way.

Try testing on the daily and hourly time frames first but you need to find a strategy that fits you’re style and time you have for trading

Thanks for the replay Sandy , but H1 H4 looks similar … and for confirmation of a trade do you mean using same indicators on H1 and H4 to confirm … or it can be different but similar -indicator-… Thank you

I’m new at forex, but I’ve been paper trading using the 3 month/daily charts primarily, and then switching to the 15 day/4 hour charts for confirmation of some trades. Another cool one I discovered yesterday was the 1 year/week chart, which is even further confirmation. It was easy to see the formation of a new trend on it, and it made me feel better about staying in a position over the weekend.

The idea is that anything less than a 4hr chart is a lot of noise to sort through, and may only be suited to scalpers who want to enter and exit a trade quickly for a gain of a few bucks. To me, it’s a lot less stressful and more profitable to trade longer term - the entire day or multiple days. For instance, using the daily charts, I entered a trade on Thursday and left it overnight. The next morning, I was up 100+ pips, and had an extra $1,000 in my account. I was making money while I was asleep. You can’t do that on a 15 minute chart because you have to be constantly watching it. Then, yesterday morning, I decided to rack up a few extra bucks before the market closed for the weekend, and saw an excellent setup on the daily chart. The 4hr and weekly confirmed it. My intention was to just be in it until the end of the day, but it looked good enough to hold onto for another day or two. By market close, I was up another $700 in my account, all while I was driving to another state to see my grandmother. That’s the power of the higher time frames.

It’s not so easy to say which is best as this is down to the trader. Some traders love the 5min but hate the hourly and daily as they prefer fast day trading.

Others like me prefer the H1, H4 and daily for strategies but there are others who prefer to trade the weekly and monthly charts.

I simply don’t have the patience for the weekly or monthly charts .

As you’re new just like everyone was you need to find what your comfortable trading, but start with the hourly strategies so you can get used to trading then experiment with different time frames and strategies.

Add a note I work 0800 - 1700 gmt in London so for me the hourly and daily strategies work best so I can set the trades up and check on them every few hours. I simply don’t have the time to watch the charts for the 5min strategies most of the time.

Just demo trade and your find what fits you best. But you must feel comfortable otherwise your rush, make mistakes and that it’s when you’re lose money!!

Spot on!

I just don’t have the patience for trades to stay open for days or weeks hence why I don’t trade them but there is no right or wrong way in forex.

We all have to do it in a way that is comfortable for our style: )

Take the babypips school that is excellent and browse the various threads there are alot of good strategies here of all types that there it’s bounds to be something to suit you

Also be careful of relying on indicators make sure you know exactly how they work so you don’t have any suprises down the road!

I have made 1576$ yesterday too by selling spot silver and guess what i was watching the 15 minutes chart , and 30m … it does work sometimes with the 15m , 30m … i dont know if you had some bad experience using them … anyway thank you all for sharing … and please trylikeafool say HI to granma;)

There is no such thing as a “best” time frame. All charts show the exact same data, tick data. The amount of tick data compressed into a bar on a chart is the only difference. The larger the time frame, the more data contained within a bar.

What appears to be a long, sustained trend on the one, two or five minute chart may only be a small portion of a candle’s wick on the hourly or daily chart. Because of the fractal nature of chart representations, the long sustained trend you see on the five minute chart IS a long sustained trend… but only on the five minute chart. It may be only a small, insignificant blip on the daily chart and trying to reconcile the two to make a trading decision is folly.

There are, however, two reasons that immediately come to mind for having multiple time frames in view.

  1. The trend is your friend. If the larger time frame is showing a sustained trend and your analysis confirms that such a trend is likely to continue, then price movements in the direction of that trend on the smaller time frame will generally be much larger than the counter-trend trade.

  2. The different charts can offer different signals. If you, for example, only trade a certain candlestick formation when a certain oscillator does X, then this particular signal may appear on the five minute chart and no other. It may appear on the daily but not on smaller timeframes. It may appear on multiple time frames. It is up to the trader to determine if multiple time frame analysis is beneficial for this particular system or not.

I, for one, usually just stick to one time frame, the one hour. The smaller time frames require constant watching and the larger time frames produce trades too infrequently for my style of trading.

The only advice I can give is to try both methods (single time frame analysis and multi-time frame analysis) and see if you find any benefit to using multiple time frames. Some find benefit from it whereas I do not. If you are using larger time frames along with smaller ones, do not let the time spread be too great. In other words, use the five minute with the one hour or the one hour with the daily. Do not try and find any revelations from comparing the five minute to the daily or weekly – you will find no correlation.

I agree that every trader has their own style, and you’ll have to experiment until you find what you’re comfortable with. For me, I don’t want to have to sit in front of the computer all day because there are other things I’d rather do with my time. I have to admit, since I’m new, I haven’t held a position for longer than 24 hours before, but it can be extremely profitable if you have the guts and patience to do it. I nearly closed my position before the markets closed yesterday because I don’t have the experience to know what happens over the weekend. But, since it’s not real money, and the setup looks really good, I’m chancing it. Hopefully, I’ll be proved correct come next week. If this trade goes my way over the next several days, I can easily pull in several thousand dollars - I just have to wait out the market noise. My stop is now at break even, so if it goes against me, I didn’t lose anything.

Thank you John … i think we have something in common … i only use one chart too but the 15M chart … but i also check the daily once a week … i also tade on trends :wink:

Just be sure to get lots of practice and be disciplined before trading live.

This is good advice someone gave me similar advice on babypips long ago and that’s how I ended up trading the style I do it may take some time to figure out what you prefer but just experiment until you figure it out.

It’s something every test has to do so you’re not alone and I do know hard forex can be and is!!

I use Daily,H4 and H1 chart’s to gauge the market flow and accordingly i take trade’s on M15 or M5 .

Why the smaller time frame charts ?
Well, it gives me a trade with tight stop and so i can enter into the bit early.

for some, viewing several charts of different timeframes at the same time gives a perspective… or a better perspective quickly.
looking at a minute chart is not for most traders. you need lots of experience and very fast reaction times to trade with quick timeframes such as 1 minute on a consistent basis

easy and fast money is acquired by trading with trends. it’s the ideal way to trade for most traders