Technical Indicator Library

What Technical Indicators Are Available to Traders?

Technical indicators fall into four broad categories: trend (where price has been heading, e.g. moving averages, MACD), momentum (how fast price is moving, e.g. RSI, Stochastic), volatility (how much price is swinging, e.g. Bollinger Bands, ATR), and volume (how much is being traded, e.g. VWAP, On-Balance Volume). Most traders combine one indicator from a maximum of two categories rather than stacking several that measure the same underlying behavior.

Indicator Library

Filter by category. Indicators with a guide link have a full page with formula, settings, signals, and worked examples; the rest are reference rows for indicators planned for future guides.

What Is a Technical Indicator?

A technical indicator is a mathematical calculation applied to price, volume, or both, plotted on or below a chart to describe some aspect of past market behavior — direction, speed, volatility, or participation. Every indicator is a summary of history, not a forecast; it tells you what already happened to price and volume, and a trader interprets what that summary might imply.

Leading indicators, like RSI and Stochastic, try to signal a possible change in direction before price confirms it — at the cost of more false signals. Lagging indicators, like moving averages and MACD, confirm a trend after it's already underway — at the cost of a delayed signal. Neither category is inherently better; they answer different questions and are often used together.

The Four Indicator Categories

Trend indicators

Answer "which direction, and how strong?" Moving averages smooth price into a single line traders use as dynamic support/resistance or crossover signals; MACD compares two moving averages to gauge whether trend momentum is accelerating or fading; ADX measures trend strength without indicating direction.

Momentum indicators

Answer "how fast, and is it slowing down?" RSI and the Stochastic Oscillator compare recent gains to recent losses or the close to a recent range, both scaled 0–100, to flag when a move looks stretched relative to its own recent history.

Volatility indicators

Answer "how much is price swinging?" Bollinger Bands widen and narrow around a moving average as volatility changes; Average True Range converts recent price swings into a single number useful for sizing stops.

Volume indicators

Answer "how much conviction is behind the move?" VWAP tracks the volume-weighted average price a session has traded at; On-Balance Volume accumulates volume in the direction of each day's close as a rough participation gauge.

Combining Indicators Without Overloading a Chart

Two indicators from the same category often move together and largely repeat each other's signal — RSI and Stochastic, for example, both derive from recent price range and frequently agree. Pairing indicators from different categories, such as one trend indicator with one momentum indicator, gives each one a distinct question to answer instead of duplicating the same one. A chart with five overlapping oscillators isn't more informative than a chart with one; it just makes disagreement between indicators harder to notice.

Common Mistakes When Using Multiple Indicators

• Stacking correlated indicators — several momentum oscillators on one chart usually agree with each other, not add independent information.
• Treating every signal as a trade trigger — an indicator reading is one input, not an automatic buy or sell instruction.
• Ignoring the indicator's category when troubleshooting — a lagging trend indicator won't catch an early reversal, and expecting it to is a mismatch between the tool and the question.
• Changing settings until a chart "looks right" in hindsight — settings tuned to past data on one asset often don't hold up going forward.
• Ignoring price structure — support, resistance, and trendlines give indicator readings context they don't have on their own.

Limitations

Every technical indicator is derived entirely from historical price and/or volume. None of them incorporate a company's fundamentals, a token's on-chain activity, or unscheduled news and events, and none reliably predicts the timing or size of a future move. Indicators describe conditions; they don't guarantee outcomes.

Technical Indicator FAQs

Related Reading

• Chart pattern library — price-structure patterns that often get read alongside indicator signals.
• Position sizing and risk per trade — sizing a trade once an indicator or pattern lines up.
• Order simulator — how an order actually fills once you've decided to act.