You only have one timeframe to trade. Which one do you pick?

Beginner Questions
66

I trade mostly from 8-hour charts. I like them and am surprised more people don’t use them.

They have no real noise and are slow enough for some of the indicators designed for daily charts still to work ok for directional bias.

They kind of approximately divide up the day into the Asian, European and US trading sessions, which is easy.

If you sleep for about 8 hours per night, you can easily check before and after your night-time.

If you work for about 8 hours per day, you can check before and after work.

It depends a bit on your time zone, I guess, like many things, but they’re really very convenient, all round. For non-scalpers.

3 Likes
67

I voted for 5M and 4H, honestly best of both worlds.

68

now that i think about it, most my analysis on hfm are on the 1H and 4H most probably its gonna be the 4H. its like a sweet spot for me.

69

20min and 4hr

70

An additional question -
Which time-frame offers you opportunities and dependable TA to allow you to add to your original trade when it is in profit?

What?!?!?
You do not add to your winners?!?!? Seriously?

4 Likes
71

:vulcan_salute::alien:This is an interesting one, I use all of them. Depends on what am looking for, example a swing trade or day trading…most importantly it depends on the market structure at that given time, if it’s ranging on the daily timeframe ,you would find me on 4hour for direction and 1 hour for setups and 15 or 30 minutes for entries

72

I voted for 1 minute. I like a lot of trades, well potential trades lets say, in a trading session.

73

This is my situation, too. Maybe not quite as much as you.

I voted 5 minutes, which I mostly use. I won’t have trades open overnight and if I try to use a 15 minute chart I can only really open trades in the first half of the day.

The comment above about 3 minute bars is interesting!

74

My strategy and analyisis needed is quite simple so easy to execute on 1 min.

1 Like
75

H4 all day long!
My strategy has H4 and D1 but if I want to choose only one, it’s H4.

76

I use P&F (point and figure) charts, and they don’t have a timeframe in the normal way.

They focus on changes in price, not changes in time. In a similar kind of way to “Renko”, in that sense.

I find them much more convenient, because I can trade at any time of day or night, using them, without needing to worry about volatility, which is already taken into account for me in the way the charts are displayed. It’s just one less thing to worry about, so it makes it easier for me.

2 Likes
77

Only the back test of a strategy can tell what time frame is best for it.

78

It sounds like a very big advantage? This makes me wonder they’re not more widely used?

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79

I think they are - more often in renko format (it’s the same thing: only the display is different). But maybe just not much by Babypips members(?).

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80

Exactly. Point & Figure and Renko are essentially the same thing. The difference is in the display: with Renko, each brick is a separate “bar” on the chart but with P&F a new “bar” starts only when there’s a change of direction as defined by the user-determined reversal-size.

2 Likes
81

15m and 1h, i don’t want to stay too long in the market i prefer day trading, so i can enjoy my day doing other things while i manage my time, Cheers

82

What if market conditions change as compared to backtesting? Doesn’t that make the backtest data a bit less valuable?

83

Wow really good turn out on the voting but still surprising on what a lot of you are trading.

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I definitely didn’t expect “Other”!

1 Like
84

Did you notice that most of the people who voted “other” have been banned?

The thread isn’t yet 3 months old. Out of 121 voters (as of today) more than a quarter have been banned for alleged “repeat forum policy violations,” some of them apparently without ever having made a post all - not in this thread and not in any other thread, either!! :confounded: :confounded: :confounded:

2 Likes
85

How did you even notice that?

Bots and scammers is my guess. It’s a prime hunting ground.

1 Like