Volume-Weighted Average Price (VWAP)

VWAP is the average price traded since the start of the session, with each bar weighted by its volume, drawn as a line on the price chart. For crypto the session is the UTC day, so the line starts again at midnight UTC and builds through the day. It answers a simple question, what has the average participant paid today, and is widely used as an intraday benchmark.

VWAP shows where today's volume has been done on average. It does not predict direction, it is not a support or resistance level by itself, and it says little on daily or higher timeframes.

• Price above or below the line. Price above VWAP means the market is trading above today's volume-weighted average, which is read as buyers being in control for the day. Below it, sellers.
• Returns to the line. In a trending day, pullbacks often meet VWAP before continuing. In a ranging day, price tends to oscillate around it.
• Early versus late in the day. Just after midnight UTC the line rests on very few bars and moves easily. Later in the day it carries the whole session's volume and moves slowly.
• Execution benchmark. Buying below VWAP or selling above it means doing better than the day's average price.

These are ways to read the line, not entry signals on their own.

This indicator has no adjustable inputs. It uses the typical price, (high + low + close) / 3, and resets at midnight UTC. For a VWAP that starts from a swing and has bands, use Anchored VWAP.

From the first bar of each UTC day, the indicator keeps two running totals: typical price times volume, and volume. VWAP is one divided by the other:

typical price = (high + low + close) / 3

at midnight UTC:  sumPV = 0, sumV = 0
each bar:         sumPV = sumPV + typical price * volume
                  sumV  = sumV + volume
                  VWAP  = sumPV / sumV

The line resets at the first bar whose time falls on a new UTC day, so each day's line is independent of the day before. On a daily chart every bar is its own session, so the line equals each bar's typical price.

The first day in view is usually partial: the chart's history starts part-way through a day, so the earliest bars average only what has loaded, and their values change as more history loads behind them. No bands are drawn.

• It is an intraday tool. On daily and higher timeframes it reduces to each bar's typical price, which adds little.
• It is weak early in the session. In the first hours after midnight UTC it rests on few bars and can swing with each one.
• The reset is fixed to UTC. Crypto trades around the clock, and midnight UTC may not match the session you care about. Anchored VWAP starts from a price swing instead.
• It lags late in the day. With a whole day of volume behind it, the line barely moves even after a large move in price.
• It is not a strategy. On its own it carries no risk management, sizing or exit.

• Anchored VWAP. The volume-weighted average price since the most recent swing low or high, with deviation bands, showing what buyers or sellers since that turn have paid on average.
• Volume Weighted Moving Average (VWMA). A moving average in which each bar counts in proportion to its volume, so prices that traded heavily pull the line more than quiet ones.
• Volume Profile Fixed Range. Volume by price over the last 200 bars, drawn as horizontal rows with the Point of Control and value area, showing where the most trading was done.