What is crypto trading and how does it actually work?

Crypto trading is the act of buying and selling digital currencies, such as Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), or Solana (SOL), with the goal of profiting from price changes. Unlike investing, where you purchase an asset and hold it for months or years regardless of short-term volatility, trading focuses on shorter timeframes: hours, days, or weeks at most.

The mechanics are straightforward. You buy an asset at one price and sell it at a higher price. The difference, minus any exchange fees, is your profit. When you believe a price will fall, some trading styles allow you to sell first and buy back lower, which is called shorting. Most beginners start with the simpler approach: buying assets they expect to rise in value.

Most people hear about crypto through news headlines or conversations with friends who made money on Bitcoin. The idea seems simple enough: buy low, sell high. But the moment you actually sit down at an exchange, questions pile up fast. What pairs should you trade? What does a bid and ask spread mean? Is this the right time to buy, or are you already too late? Let us start at the beginning.

These two things get confused constantly, and the distinction matters because they require completely different mindsets and strategies.

An investor buys Bitcoin at $60,000 and holds it for two years, not caring much about the swings in between. A trader buys Bitcoin at $60,000 expecting it to hit $63,000 within the next few days, then sells and moves on to the next opportunity. Both approaches can be profitable. Many experienced participants do both at the same time: they hold a long-term position in BTC and ETH while actively trading a smaller portion of their portfolio.

Trading happens on platforms called exchanges, which match buyers and sellers in real time. There are two types worth knowing about.

Centralised exchanges (CEX) are run by companies. Binance, Coinbase, Kraken, and Bybit are the most used examples. They require account registration with identity verification, they hold your funds in custody, and they offer high liquidity, fast execution, and a wide range of trading tools. For the vast majority of beginners, a centralised exchange is the right place to start.

Decentralised exchanges (DEX) operate through smart contracts on a blockchain. Uniswap and dYdX are examples. You connect your own wallet, there is no account to create, and you retain control of your funds at all times. They are more complex to use and typically have lower liquidity on most pairs.

Most of what you read in this guide applies to centralised exchanges. They are also the platforms supported by 3Commas for automated trading.

Learn more about how crypto exchanges work (when article is finished)

Why people trade crypto and what to know before you start

The appeal of crypto trading comes from a few things that traditional markets simply do not offer. Markets are open all day and all night, every day of the year. You can start with a small amount of capital. The volatility that makes crypto look risky is also what creates trading opportunities that do not exist in slower-moving asset classes.

That said, the same volatility cuts both ways. The majority of new traders lose money in their first months. This is not because crypto is impossible to trade profitably. It is because most beginners enter without a real strategy, react to price moves with emotion, and either over-risk early or give up too soon after a bad week.

Before you put real money at risk, it helps to understand what you are getting into and set realistic expectations.

Beyond the 24/7 availability, several other factors draw people toward crypto trading specifically. The market is global, so major price moves can happen at any time based on news, regulatory announcements, or shifts in sentiment across different regions. There is also a much wider range of assets to trade compared to traditional stock markets, which means more opportunities for traders who know what to look for.

For those who prefer not to monitor charts all day, automated tools change the equation entirely. A well-configured DCA or GRID bot can execute a strategy continuously without you needing to sit in front of a screen.

Technically, you can start with as little as $20 to $50 on most exchanges. In practice, $500 to $1,000 gives you more flexibility. At that level you can spread capital across a few trading pairs, run a bot strategy with meaningful allocation, and not have every single fee eat into your results.

Whatever amount you start with, it should be money you can afford to lose entirely. Treat your first few months as paid education. The goal is not profit right away; the goal is to develop good decision-making habits before the stakes get higher.

The most popular cryptocurrencies for trading

Not all cryptocurrencies trade the same way. Some have deep liquidity and predictable price patterns. Others are highly speculative, with thin order books and sudden moves that can wipe out a position in minutes. Beginners should start with established, high-volume assets.

The most popular cryptocurrencies for trading are: 

Why liquidity matters more than most beginners realise

Liquidity refers to how easily you can buy or sell an asset without your own order moving the price. Bitcoin and Ethereum have enormous liquidity: billions of dollars worth of orders are sitting in the order book at any given time. You can enter and exit positions quickly and at predictable prices.

A low-liquidity altcoin might look attractive because of a recent price spike. But if you try to sell a meaningful position in a thin market, your own sell order can push the price down against you before it fills. This is called slippage, and it catches many beginners off guard.

Stick to the top assets first. As your understanding of market mechanics grows, you will learn to identify when a lower-liquidity asset presents a genuine opportunity rather than just noise.

Manual trading versus automated trading: which fits you?

This is one of the most important decisions you will make as a new trader. Both manual and automated approaches can be profitable. The right choice depends on how much time you have, how disciplined you are under pressure, and whether you want to be actively involved in every trade or prefer to set a strategy and let it run.

A trading bot is software that executes trades automatically based on rules you configure in advance. On 3Commas, you define the strategy parameters: how much to invest, at what price levels to place orders, when to take profit, and what conditions trigger the bot. You then run a backtest against historical data to see how the strategy would have performed over the past month or year. If the results look solid, you deploy the bot with real capital.

The bot then handles everything: placing orders, tracking positions, reinvesting profits if you choose, and shutting down safely if market conditions fall outside your defined range.

Risk management is the single most important skill in trading. Not chart patterns, not indicator settings, not which coin to pick. Risk management. Without it, even a profitable strategy will eventually produce a losing streak large enough to wipe out everything you gained before it.

The good news is that the core rules are simple. The hard part is following them consistently when you are in a losing trade and your instincts are telling you to do something different.

Never risk more than 1 to 2 percent per trade. If your account holds $1,000, your maximum loss on any single trade should be $10 to $20. This allows you to survive a string of ten or even twenty losing trades without destroying your account.

Always set a stop-loss before you enter. Decide the price at which you will exit if the trade goes against you before you open the position. Once set, do not move it to avoid taking a loss.

Diversify across assets. Do not put your entire trading capital into one coin. Spread positions across BTC, ETH, and a smaller allocation of higher-risk assets.

Keep a trading journal. Log every trade with the entry price, exit price, reasoning, and outcome. Review it weekly. Patterns in your decision-making become visible very quickly when you have the data in front of you.

Set a daily loss limit. If you hit your maximum loss for the day, stop trading. Revenge trading after a bad session is how small losses become catastrophic ones.

Understanding futures, leverage, and the Margin Ratio

Futures trading lets you use leverage, which means borrowing capital to open a larger position than your account balance would normally allow. A 10x leveraged position on $100 means you are effectively trading $1,000 worth of the asset. Gains and losses are both multiplied.

For beginners, this is one of the fastest paths to losing your entire account. Before you even consider futures, you need to understand the Margin Ratio, which measures how close your position is to being automatically liquidated by the exchange.

Common mistakes every beginner makes and how to avoid them

The following patterns appear in almost every beginner trading account. None of them are unique to any one person. They are predictable, understandable, and entirely avoidable once you know what to look for.

How to develop your first crypto trading strategy

A trading strategy is a set of specific, repeatable rules. It defines when you enter a trade, how much you risk, and when you exit. Without it, you are not trading: you are reacting to whatever the market throws at you, which is a guaranteed path to inconsistent results.

The process for building your first strategy does not need to be complicated. In fact, simpler strategies are usually more durable because they are easier to execute consistently without second-guessing yourself.

Step 1: Choose a style that fits your schedule

Your trading style needs to match the time you actually have available. A day trading strategy requires you to be in front of charts for hours at a time. A GRID bot strategy requires you to configure it once and check in weekly. Be honest about your schedule before you commit to a style.

DCA (Dollar Cost Averaging): Buy fixed amounts at regular intervals or price drops. Removes the stress of timing the market. Best run as an automated bot with backtesting.

Swing trading: Hold positions for two to ten days, targeting larger price moves. Requires one to two hours per day for analysis and position monitoring.

GRID trading: Profit from price movement within a defined range. Fully automatable, works well in sideways markets, requires very little daily attention once set up.

Day trading: Open and close positions within a single day. Requires full-time focus and fast execution. Not recommended as a starting approach.

Step 2: Define clear entry and exit rules

Write down the exact conditions that must be met before you open a trade. This forces you to think through the logic while you are calm, before the pressure of a live market situation.

Running a backtest means testing your strategy rules against historical price data to see how they would have performed. The 3Commas backtesting tool lets you do this for any bot configuration, against one month, three months, or a full year of historical data. If the results are not consistently profitable across different market conditions, adjust the settings before committing real capital.

Step 4: Start with small amounts and review weekly

Launch your strategy with a small allocation, $100 to $200, even if you plan to scale much larger eventually. At this stage your objective is to confirm that the strategy behaves in live conditions the way it did in backtesting. Review performance after two weeks. Make small adjustments if needed. Only increase your capital allocation once you have at least 60 days of consistent results.

Getting started with crypto trading on 3Commas

3Commas connects to your exchange via API. Your funds stay on the exchange at all times: 3Commas never holds your money, and you never grant withdrawal permissions. The platform handles strategy execution, including order placement, position monitoring, take-profit triggers, and stop-loss management, all based on the rules you define.

Connect your exchange. Link Binance, Coinbase, Bybit, Kraken, or OKX using an API key. Enable trading permissions only. Never grant withdrawal access.

Explore SmartTrade. Use the SmartTrade terminal for your first manual trades with stop-loss and take-profit already built into the interface. No risk of forgetting either.

Set up your first DCA bot. Choose BTC/USDT or ETH/USDT. Configure a basic strategy. Run the backtester for three to twelve months of historical data. Adjust settings until results are consistently positive.

Start small and review weekly. Launch with $100 to $200. Review after two weeks. Increase capital only after consistent positive results over 60 days.

Frequently asked questions about crypto trading

Everything You Need to Know and Expert Tips from Inside Traders

Crypto Trading for Beginners | 3Commas

A quick summary of everything this guide covers.

• Crypto trading means buying and selling digital assets to profit from price movements. It is different from long-term investing, where you simply hold.

• Markets run 24 hours a day, seven days a week on exchanges like Binance, Coinbase, and Kraken. That is one of the biggest differences from traditional stock markets.

• Prices are driven by supply and demand, market sentiment, news events, and what large holders decide to do with their positions.

• The most expensive beginner mistakes are trading without a plan, ignoring risk management, and moving to futures before you are ready.

• You can start with as little as $20, though $500 to $1,000 gives you room to run a real strategy across multiple pairs.

• Automated bots like DCA and GRID remove emotion from trading and can run your strategy around the clock, without requiring experience to set up.

• Spot trading first, futures later. Always use a stop loss. Never risk more than 1 to 2 percent on a single trade.

Crypto Trading for Beginners: Everything You Need to Know

How to read a candlestick chart like a pro 

Master candlestick chart reading for crypto trading. Understand bodies, wicks, the patterns that actually matter, and how to use them to time better entries and exits in volatile crypto markets.

What is a candlestick chart and why traders use it

A candlestick chart shows the price action of an asset across a chosen time interval. Each candle covers a fixed window (one minute, one hour, one day) and packs four pieces of data into a single shape: the open, the close, the high, and the low for that window.

Crypto traders use candlesticks for the same reason they have dominated technical analysis. A line chart tells you where the price ended. A candlestick chart tells you what happened on the way there. That difference matters enormously when you are trying to decide whether to enter a trade.

Why candlesticks beat line charts for crypto trading

More information per candle: four data points (open, high, low, close) versus one (close) on a line chart.

Visible momentum: the size and color of each candle communicate the strength of buyers or sellers at a glance.

Visible rejection: long wicks show where price tried to break a level and got pushed back, which is invisible on a line chart.

Recurring patterns: specific shapes appear repeatedly at meaningful price levels, giving you a probabilistic edge over time.

A short note on history (and why it matters for crypto)

Candlesticks were developed by Japanese rice traders in the 1700s and brought to Western markets by Steve Nison in the 1980s. The interesting part for crypto traders is that the same shapes still work, on a market that runs 24/7 across hundreds of exchanges and dozens of pairs. Why? Because every market is still made of buyers and sellers reacting to fear, greed, and uncertainty. The asset changes. The psychology does not.

Read more: Crypto market sentiment indicators

The anatomy of a single candlestick: bodies, wicks, and colors

Before any pattern matters, you need to be able to read a single candle. Once that is automatic, everything else becomes pattern recognition built on top of a foundation you already have.

The body is the thick rectangular part of the candle. It sits between the open price and the close price for that timeframe.

Green body (bullish): the close was higher than the open. Buyers were in control during that period. The bottom of the body is the open, the top is the close.

Red body (bearish): the close was lower than the open. Sellers were in control. The top of the body is the open, the bottom is the close.

Some platforms use white and black instead of green and red. It is the same logic. Some traders also customise to other colour pairs. 

The thin lines extending above and below the body are wicks. They show how far price travelled outside the open-to-close range during that period.

Upper wick: the highest price reached in that window. A long upper wick means buyers pushed price up but sellers slammed it back down before the close.

Lower wick: the lowest price reached. A long lower wick means sellers pushed price down but buyers stepped in and pulled it back up before the close.

Wicks are where the real story lives. The body shows who won; the wicks show how hard the loser fought before they lost.

Timeframe context: how 1-minute, 1-hour, and daily candles differ

A candle does not have a fixed importance. Its meaning depends entirely on the timeframe it represents.

Imagine a daily BTC/USDT candle with these values:

This is a green candle with a body that runs from 67,200 to 68,400. The upper wick is short (only 400 points above the close). The lower wick is longer (700 points below the open). The story: bulls were in charge most of the day, but early in the session sellers tried to push price down and got rejected at 66,500, after which buyers took over and ran price up, closing near the highs. Strong, decisive day for the bulls.

How to read candle size and shape for market signals

Before you learn a single named pattern, learn to read individual candles by their size and shape. This skill alone gets you most of the way.

A candle with a large body and small or no wicks shows a one-sided session. One side took control from the open and held it all the way to the close. The bigger the body relative to recent candles, the stronger the conviction.

Big green body, small wicks: aggressive buying, often appears at breakouts or trend continuations.

Big red body, small wicks: aggressive selling, often appears at breakdowns or rejection of resistance.

Small-body candles: indecision and consolidation

A candle with a tiny body shows that buyers and sellers basically traded back to where they started. Neither side could move price decisively. These candles are common during consolidation, after a strong move when the market is digesting, or just before a breakout.

On their own, small bodies are not a trade signal. They are a pause signal: pay attention, because the next decisive candle often defines the next move.

A long wick is one of the most useful single-candle signals in crypto.

Long upper wick with a small body near the bottom: buyers pushed price up, hit something they could not break, and got pushed back down. This is a rejection of higher prices. At resistance, this often precedes a downward move.

Long lower wick with a small body near the top: sellers pushed price down, found a level buyers defended, and got pushed back up. This is a rejection of lower prices. At support, this often precedes an upward bounce.

Doji candles: the pause that precedes a move

A Doji is a candle where open and close are essentially the same price, leaving an almost invisible body and visible wicks on one or both sides. It signals exact equilibrium between buyers and sellers.

In a strong trend, a Doji often marks an inflection point: either a brief pause before continuation, or the moment momentum shifts. The candles that follow a Doji are usually more important than the Doji itself.

Why size matters more in crypto than in stocks

Crypto markets run 24/7, with no market open or close, and they routinely move 5 to 10 percent in a single day on majors and 20 to 50 percent on smaller alts. That changes how you read candle size:

A 3 percent daily candle in a stock is dramatic. The same candle in crypto is often noise.

Always read size relative to recent candles, not in absolute terms. A candle is large because it is bigger than what came before it, not because it cleared an arbitrary number.

Volatility regimes change. The size that defined a strong candle two months ago may be average today. Recalibrate periodically.

The right way to think about candlestick patterns

Before listing specific patterns, here is the mental model that separates traders who actually use candlesticks profitably from those who get whipsawed by them.

Most consistent traders use candles in this order:

Build the plan first. Identify the trend, key support and resistance levels, and the levels where you would want to buy or sell. This is structural analysis, and it has nothing to do with candlestick patterns yet.

Use candles to time the entry. When price reaches one of your pre-identified levels, watch the candles to see how it reacts. A strong rejection candle at support is a green light. A weak Doji or a candle that closes through the level is a warning to wait or skip the trade.


This is exactly the opposite of what most beginners do, which is scan the chart for patterns first and then try to invent a reason to trade them. That order is how losing trades get justified after the fact.

There are dozens of named bullish patterns. The five below cover roughly 80 percent of the bullish reversal and continuation signals you will actually need in crypto.

A single candle with a small body near the top and a long lower wick (at least twice the length of the body). The lower wick shows sellers pushed price down hard, but buyers took control before the close.

When it matters: at the bottom of a downtrend, near a support level. A hammer in the middle of a range is just a candle with a long lower wick, not a meaningful signal.

Same idea as a hammer, but the long wick is on top and the small body is at the bottom. It shows buyers pushed price up but did not hold the highs. At the bottom of a downtrend, this still often marks the first attempt by buyers to take control, with confirmation from the next candle.

A two-candle pattern. A small red candle is followed by a much larger green candle whose body completely covers (engulfs) the previous body. It is one of the most reliable single signals in crypto.

What it means: sellers had control for one period, then buyers showed up with enough force to wipe out that entire candle and close above where it opened. A clear shift in the balance of power.

A three-candle reversal pattern that appears at the bottom of a downtrend:

First candle: a long red body, continuing the downtrend.

Second candle: a small body (often a Doji), showing indecision.

Third candle: a long green body that closes well into the body of the first candle.

The pattern shows the sequence of seller exhaustion (red), pause (small body), and buyer takeover (green). It is more reliable than a single hammer because three candles confirm the shift.

A two-candle pattern. After a strong red candle, a green candle opens lower than the red close but rallies and closes above the midpoint of the previous red body. It is a softer version of bullish engulfing: the takeover is real but not complete.

Bearish patterns are the mirror image of the bullish ones. Same logic in reverse, same context rules apply: they only matter at levels where they should matter.

A single candle with a small body at the bottom and a long upper wick. Buyers pushed price up aggressively, hit a ceiling, and got rejected back down. At the top of an uptrend or at a resistance level, this is one of the cleanest top-rejection signals in crypto.

Same shape as a hammer (small body at top, long lower wick), but appearing at the top of an uptrend. The long lower wick shows that for the first time, sellers were able to push price meaningfully down during the period, even if buyers eventually pulled it back. That is a warning sign that demand is weakening.

The bearish twin of the engulfing pattern. A small green candle is followed by a much larger red candle whose body completely covers the previous body. It signals a clear shift from buyer to seller control. Treat it the same way as the bullish version: only meaningful at a relevant price level, most reliable on the 4-hour and daily charts.

The bearish version of the morning star. Three candles at the top of an uptrend:

First candle: a long green body, continuing the uptrend.

Second candle: a small body or Doji, showing indecision.

Third candle: a long red body that closes well into the body of the first candle.

A two-candle pattern. After a strong green candle, a red candle opens higher than the green close but sells off and closes below the midpoint of the previous green body. The bearish counterpart of the piercing pattern.

Using bearish patterns to set stops and exits

Bearish reversal patterns at known resistance are useful in two ways:

If you are long, they are a signal to tighten stops or take profits. A bearish engulfing at a key level you have been watching is exactly the kind of confirmation that should trigger a planned exit.

If you are flat, they can be the timing trigger for a short setup you had already mapped out structurally.

Either way, the pattern times an action you had planned. It does not invent the action.

Reading candlestick charts in different crypto market conditions

The patterns above work everywhere. Their reliability changes with the market environment around them. Crypto adds a few wrinkles that traders coming from stocks have to internalise.

During fast-moving news events (regulatory announcements, exchange failures, ETF decisions, large macro headlines), candles get distorted in two ways: bodies become enormous, and wicks regularly span 5 to 10 percent of price. Pattern reading becomes much harder. The right call during these events is usually to wait for the volatility to settle and then read the structure that emerges over the next several candles, rather than trying to trade individual signals during the chaos.

Crypto markets do not close on Saturdays and Sundays. Volume drops, but they keep moving. Weekend candles often look misleading: lower volume can produce small bodies and long wicks that look like meaningful patterns but are really just thin liquidity. On daily charts, this rarely matters. On lower timeframes, weekend patterns often fail more than weekday patterns.

Asian early morning hours (when both US and European traders are off) tend to have lower volume on most pairs. Patterns formed during these windows are less reliable because fewer participants means more random-looking moves. If a pattern looks too clean to be true and the volume on the candle is well below the recent average, it usually is.

Candlestick reliability is not equal across pairs:

BTC/USDT and ETH/USDT: the most reliable pairs for candlestick reading. Deep liquidity means each candle reflects genuine consensus.

Top 20 alt/USDT pairs: patterns work, but with more noise. Daily and 4-hour charts are still trustworthy; lower timeframes are messier.

Smaller alt pairs: candles are heavily influenced by individual large traders and thin order books. Single candles can be triggered by one large order rather than collective sentiment, making patterns far less reliable.


Read more: Reading more about trading pairs

Common mistakes beginners make reading candlestick charts

These mistakes drain accounts faster than missing a pattern ever could. They are also easy to fix, once you know to look for them.

Combining candlestick reading with other indicators

Candlesticks are powerful, but they work better as part of a layered approach. The right combinations turn a single signal into a high-conviction setup.

Volume: the single best confirmation tool

Volume tells you how many participants were behind a candle. A bullish engulfing on twice the average volume is far more meaningful than the same shape on half the average volume. As a quick rule:

Pattern + above-average volume: take it seriously.

Pattern + below-average volume: treat with skepticism, especially on smaller timeframes.

Pattern + volume drying up before it: often the most reliable signal of all, because it shows exhaustion of the prior trend.

Moving averages: trend context in one line

A simple moving average (SMA) or exponential moving average (EMA) on the daily chart gives you the dominant trend at a glance. Combine with candlesticks like this:

Price above the 50-day or 200-day moving average and rising: bullish patterns at pullbacks to the MA are high-quality long setups.

Price below the moving average and falling: bearish patterns at retraces to the MA are high-quality short setups.

Price chopping around the MA with no clear direction: skip pattern trades, the environment does not support them.

RSI: overbought and oversold confirmation

The Relative Strength Index oscillates between 0 and 100. Above 70 is conventionally overbought, below 30 is oversold. A bearish engulfing at resistance is more powerful when RSI is also above 70. A bullish engulfing at support is more powerful when RSI is also below 30.

Support and resistance: the real foundation

Every pattern in this article is more reliable at a level that has already mattered to price. Identify those levels by drawing horizontal lines at:

Round numbers that have produced reactions ($30,000 BTC, $4,000 ETH, $100 SOL).

Previous breakout points that have flipped role (resistance becoming support, or vice versa).

Patterns at these levels are worth trading. Patterns in open space are not.

Manually scanning multiple pairs across multiple indicators is the kind of task that 3Commas bots and TradingView signals handle well. You define the conditions (pattern + RSI level + volume threshold + price near a key MA), and the system monitors the conditions across pairs and timeframes that you would never have time to watch yourself. The candle reading itself stays human; the surveillance is delegated.

One of the hardest skills in trading is telling the difference between a pullback (the trend takes a breath) and a reversal (the trend is genuinely over). Even experienced traders get it wrong sometimes. Candles will not give you certainty, but they give you better odds than guessing.

Correction: a small pullback against the prevailing trend. Price has been going up, takes a brief dip, then continues up.

Reversal: the prevailing trend is over. The uptrend ends and a new downtrend begins (or vice versa).

A lot of crypto trading happens on a phone. The chart-reading skill set is the same, but a few mobile-specific habits help.

On a 6-inch screen, a 5-minute chart with 200 candles becomes unreadable. Default to higher timeframes when you are mobile:

1-hour or 15-minute only when you have a specific reason to drill down, and only briefly.

Pinch to zoom on the structure, not the candles

Most charting apps let you zoom in horizontally on a smaller window of candles. Use this to focus on the area around current price, where you can actually count candles and see wicks clearly, rather than trying to read the full history at a glance.

Mobile is a poor environment for sustained chart-watching. It is a great environment for receiving alerts. Set price alerts at the levels where your plan would trigger a decision, then walk away from the screen until the alert fires. When it does, that is the moment to look at the candles.

If you are running bots, the 3Commas mobile app gives you a lighter footprint for monitoring active deals, checking bot performance, and pausing or stopping bots if conditions change. The candle reading happens on a chart (TradingView is the most common), and the action happens in the app. Most active mobile traders use both side by side.

Your first candlestick chart analysis: a step-by-step walkthrough

Pull up a daily chart of BTC/USDT or ETH/USDT and run through these steps. After 10 to 15 charts, this becomes second nature.

Identify the dominant trend on the daily chart. Is price making higher highs and higher lows (uptrend), lower highs and lower lows (downtrend), or oscillating in a range?

Mark the key support and resistance levels. Look for the obvious horizontal lines: recent swing highs, recent swing lows, round numbers that have produced reactions.

Locate the current candle relative to those levels. Is price near support, near resistance, or in open space?

Read the recent 5 to 10 candles. What is the size and shape telling you? Are bodies large or small? Are wicks getting longer in one direction?

Check the volume. Is the recent move on increasing or decreasing volume?

Each candlestick tells a small story about the fight between buyers and sellers in a fixed time window. The body shows who won; the wicks show how far each side pushed before being knocked back.

Crypto trading basics