Renko, Kagi, Line Break and Point & Figure charts: settings and use
Renko, Kagi, Line Break and Point & Figure charts in SuperCharting: how each is built, box size and reversal settings, and how to use them intraday.
Renko, Kagi, Line Break and Point & Figure are non-time charts: a new brick, line or column appears only when price moves far enough, not when the clock ticks. That filters out small moves and sideways noise. In SuperCharting you pick them from the chart type button, set the box size or reversal in Settings > Symbol, and they work on any interval, so intraday Renko on a 1-minute or 5-minute chart is as easy as daily Point & Figure.
How non-time charts are built
Each of these charts is built from the bars of the interval the chart is set to. Choose NSE:NIFTY on 5 minutes, switch the type to Renko, and every 5-minute close is checked against the current brick. A smaller interval reacts sooner and builds from more detail; a daily interval gives the classic end-of-day picture.
A few things are the same for all four types:
- Every brick, line or column carries the time of the bar that completed it, so the time scale still reads in dates even though the spacing is uneven.
- While the market is live, the newest brick or line keeps updating with each tick until it completes, and a reload rebuilds the same bars from the same history.
- The legend shows the settings in use, for example
Renko [ATR(14), 12.5]orPnF [ATR(14), 3.2, 3]. - Indicators are calculated on the underlying time bars, and each brick shows the value at the bar that completed it. A 14-period RSI on a Renko chart is the RSI of fourteen 5-minute bars, not of fourteen bricks.
The non-time chart types
Renko
Renko draws equal-sized bricks from closing prices. A new brick in the direction of the trend needs one box of movement; a reversal brick needs two boxes. With Wick switched on (the default), each brick shows the high and low traded while it formed.
Box size. The Box size assignment method row sets how big a brick is:
| Method | What it does | Default |
|---|---|---|
| ATR | the Average True Range of the loaded bars over ATR length bars | length 14 |
| Traditional | a fixed Box size in price, e.g. 10 points | - |
| Percentage LTP | a Percentage of the last traded price | 1% |
The box is rounded to the symbol's price step. ATR keeps the box in proportion to the market's normal movement; Traditional is best when you want round numbers you can compare day to day.
Kagi
A Kagi line keeps going in one direction while price extends, and turns only when price moves back by the reversal amount. The reversal is set with the same three methods as Renko's box: ATR, Traditional or Percentage LTP. When the line rises above the previous shoulder it becomes thick (yang, in the up colour); when it falls below the previous waist it becomes thin (yin, in the down colour). The switch from thin to thick, or back, is the change Kagi readers watch most, because it shows a swing breaking the one before it.
Line Break
Line Break, often called Three Line Break, adds a new line when the close goes beyond the last line in the direction of the trend. It reverses only when the close breaks the extreme of the last N lines, where N is Number of line (default 3). Raising it to 4 or 5 makes reversals rarer; lowering it to 2 makes them quicker. There is no box size, which makes Line Break the simplest of the four to set up.
Point & Figure
Point & Figure stacks X columns for rising prices and O columns for falling ones, one mark per box, built from closing prices. A column switches only when price reverses by Reversal amount boxes (default 3). The box size uses the same ATR, Traditional or Percentage LTP methods.
With XAUUSD on a 15-minute chart, a Traditional box of 1.0 and a reversal of 3 means a new X for every dollar up, and a switch to an O column only after a three-dollar drop from the top of the current column. Horizontal rows where columns keep stopping show support and resistance clearly, and trend lines drawn at 45 degrees are a common study.
Range bars
The chart type menu also has Range. Range bars each span the same number of price ticks. The quickest way to use them is a range interval: open the interval menu and pick 1 range, 10 ranges, 100 ranges or 1000 ranges, or add your own up to 10,000 with Add custom interval… and the Ranges unit. A range interval builds its bars from 1-minute history, see custom timeframes.
How to set up a Renko chart in SuperCharting
- Open the symbol, for example NSE:BANKNIFTY, and choose the interval, for example 3 minutes.
- Click the chart type button in the top toolbar and pick Renko.
- Click Settings (the gear) and open the Symbol tab.
- Set Box size assignment method to Traditional and type a Box size, such as 25.
- Leave Wick on to see the extremes, and pick the up and down colours if you like.
- Click Ok. The legend now reads
Renko [25]and the bricks rebuild at once.
For Kagi, Line Break and Point & Figure the steps are the same; only the rows in step 4 change.
Example: filtering an intraday trend
NSE:RELIANCE on a 1-minute candle chart can show dozens of small red and green candles in a quiet hour. Switch to Renko with ATR(14) on the same 1-minute interval and that hour may collapse into two or three bricks, while a real move of several boxes stands out as an unbroken staircase. Many traders then add a 20-period EMA and only study bricks on the right side of it, or replay the morning session with Bar Replay to practise reading the bricks as they form.
When to use which
- Renko for a clean trend view with a fixed step; good for trailing a stop one or two bricks behind.
- Kagi when you want the line's thickness to show whether swings are breaking prior highs or lows.
- Line Break when you want reversals confirmed by the last few closes, with almost no settings.
- Point & Figure for support, resistance and price targets from column counts.
Drawings from the drawing tools work on all of them. Remember that the horizontal spacing is not time, so a trend line's angle means price per brick, not price per hour. Charts and settings are for study; they do not predict where price will go.
Frequently asked questions
Why did my Renko bricks change size after a reload?
With the ATR method the box is measured from the bars loaded at that moment, so a new day of data can change it slightly. Use Traditional for a box that never moves.
Can I use Renko on a 1-minute chart?
Yes. Every non-time type works on any interval, including 1 minute and custom ones such as 45 minutes.
Do alerts work on Renko charts?
Price alerts watch the market price, not the bricks, so they trigger at the level you set whichever chart type you look at.
Why do Point & Figure columns ignore the wicks?
SuperCharting builds Point & Figure from closing prices, so intrabar highs and lows do not add boxes.