How to Read Charts

Most crypto price charts you'll come across use candlesticks rather than a simple line. Each candle represents price movement over a fixed period — a minute, an hour, a day — and packs four numbers into one shape: the opening price, the closing price, and the high and low reached during that period. The thick part of the candle, called the body, spans the open and close. The thin lines above and below, called wicks, mark the high and low.

Color tells you direction at a glance. A green (or sometimes white) candle means the price closed higher than it opened over that period; a red (or black) candle means it closed lower. Looking at a row of candles side by side gives you a sense of momentum and volatility that a single line simply can't — a chart full of long wicks, for instance, signals a lot of back-and-forth within each period, even if the closing prices look calm.

Volume, usually shown as bars beneath the price chart, tells you how much was traded during each period. Volume matters because it adds context to a price move — a sharp rise on low volume is a weaker signal than the same rise on unusually high volume, since the latter suggests broader participation rather than a handful of large trades.

Two more terms come up constantly: support and resistance. Support is a price level where an asset has historically tended to stop falling and bounce back up, often because buyers step in at that level. Resistance is the opposite — a level where price has tended to stall or reverse downward, often because sellers step in. Neither is a guarantee; they're patterns based on past behavior, not fixed rules, and can break in either direction.

Finally, pay attention to the timeframe you're looking at. A chart set to 1-minute candles will look far more chaotic than the same asset's daily or weekly chart, simply because short timeframes amplify normal noise. Zooming out generally gives a clearer picture of the underlying trend, while zooming in is more useful for timing a specific entry or exit.