A reversal bar prints only when the market actually changes its mind.
It is constantly confused with Renko, including by products that should know better. The difference is one sentence, and it changes what the chart means.
Reversal bars versus Renko — the one-line difference
The trigger is set from the previous brick’s close and never moves. Price must travel a fixed distance from that anchor. A Renko’s “reversal” setting is still distance-from-anchor, just the other way.
The trigger trails the bar’s own extreme. Push the high up and the close-the-bar level rises with it. The bar ends only when price gives back the reversal amount from the best level reached.
The practical effect: a 200-tick run becomes about fifty identical Renko bricks, or one reversal bar.
Which means the chart means something different
Worth knowing before you switch
Because a reversal bar holds an entire move, you will have far fewer bars than on a Renko or range chart of comparable sensitivity. That is the point, but it has consequences: indicators with a lookback period see much more market history per bar, so a 14-period average here is not remotely the same window as a 14-period average on a 4-tick Renko. Re-tune rather than porting settings across.
Settings
| Setting | Default | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Trend / max run (ticks, 1 = auto) | 1 | The furthest the bar may run before it seals regardless of any pullback. Deliberately the same slot UniRenko uses for Tick Trend. |
| Reversal pullback (ticks, 0 = auto) | 0 | How far price must give back from the bar’s trailing extreme to close it. Set either one and the other follows at 1:3, so the two always relate. |
| Open Offset (ticks, 0 = honest) | 0 | Cosmetic offset for the drawn open. |
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The free download opens here soon. When it does, the whole price is a free account: no card, no trial clock. One package: Renko, Reversal, Range, plus two chart styles.
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Common questions
Is UniRenko a reversal bar?
No. UniRenko is a Renko with a decoupled reversal distance — its boundaries are computed once from the previous brick’s close and never move while the bar develops. That is distance-based, not pullback-based. It is a good Renko; it is not a reversal bar.
Are these the same as momentum bars?
Broadly yes — “momentum bars” and “reversal bars” are usually two names for the same idea: a bar that runs until price retraces a set amount. Terminology varies by platform, which is part of why the confusion with Renko persists.
What should I set Trend and Reversal to?
Start on auto and leave both. The pullback is sized from the first 90 minutes of real movement — aiming for roughly six legs, deliberately fewer than a Renko would produce, because a reversal bar is meant to hold a whole move and sizing it like a brick gives you a bar per wiggle. The max run is then three times that. Set either one by hand and the other follows at the same 1:3, so you never have to pick two unrelated numbers.
Why does a reversal bar need a max run at all?
Because without one it has no upper bound. In a sustained trend a pure pullback bar can run indefinitely, and there is then nothing for the pullback amount to be a ratio of — which makes any default arbitrary. The cap is there to bound a runaway leg, not to be the usual reason a bar closes. The honest trade-off: a bar that hits the cap did not actually reverse, so on that bar the close is not a give-back.
Does the current bar repaint?
The forming bar is not final until price pulls back enough to close it, so yes, like any bar type that is not time-based. Use the included chart style to mark it.
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Provided free by Affordable Indicators, Inc. Nothing here is trading advice. Derived bar types hide time, and the bar currently forming is never final until it completes — understand both before trading from them. Not affiliated with NinjaTrader. All product and company names are the trademarks of their respective owners.