StockChartsACP
Last updated
Last updated
© StockCharts.com, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
StockChartsACP (“ACP” stands for “Advanced Charting Platform”) is a full-screen, streaming charting tool built to serve as a comprehensive, interactive technical charting platform with a ton of dynamic capabilities. It's more than just a charting workbench. With StockChartsACP, you can simultaneously have up to twelve interactive chart panels on the screen, each displaying a different chart. This level of flexibility and customization can greatly enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of technical analysis strategies.
StockChartsACP allows you to:
Create advanced technical charts. You can choose from dozens of indicators, overlays, display settings, and color schemes.
Display multiple charts on screen at once. The StockChartsACP Layouts allow you to display up to twelve charts.
Save your charts and settings. This allows on-the-go access to your account.
StockChartsACP Plug-ins. These additional indicators can supercharge your StockChartsACP experience.
Trade without leaving StockChartsACP. Use the Tradier integration available in StockChartsACP.
Check out our StockChartsACP overview video below, or just read on to learn how to get the most out of this new platform.
Note: For our long-time SharpCharts fans, rest assured that StockChartsACP will be offered alongside our traditional SharpCharts tool. The two are designed to complement each other. The SharpCharts you've always known and loved isn't going anywhere!
There are many ways to create a StockCharts ACP chart. You can:
Use the “Create a Chart” bar at the top of any of our web pages. First, change the dropdown from “SharpChart” to “ACP”, then enter the ticker symbol you wish to chart and press the “Go” button.
Click on the “ACP” link at the bottom of the SharpCharts Workbench.
Click on the “ACP” icon, which is located on most of our report pages, including the Market Summary, Sector Summary, and more.
Click on “Charts & Tools” at the top of any page, then enter a ticker symbol into the “StockChartsACP” section of that page.
Click on the “StockChartsACP” link in the “Member Tools” area of Your Dashboard.
Any of these actions will load a chart for the ticker symbol in StockChartsACP.
There are several important areas of the StockChartsACP Platform:
The Chart Area. Displays one or multiple StockChartsACP charts.
The Basic Chart Settings Menu. Change the symbol, period, range, and chart type.
The Save Button. Save your charts to StockChartsACP ChartLists for later study.
The Platform Settings Menu. Change StockChartsACP settings like full screen, crosshairs, Toggle Measurement Tool, and more.
The Chart Design Menu. Configure chart settings, add indicators, change the color scheme or chart style, annotate your chart, or configure multi-chart layouts.
The Chart Actions Menu. Create an alert, share, export chart, and more.
The Symbol Selection Menu. Find additional symbols to chart from various sources, including your SharpCharts and StockChartsACP ChartLists.
The Platform Integrations Menu. Extend the functionality of StockChartsACP with plug-ins and trading functionality.
The Chart Control Buttons. Move back and forth in the chart with fine-grained control.
The List Drawer. When you expand the drawer, this bottom panel lets you view and edit your StockChartsACP and SharpChart ChartLists, as well as the Sector Summary.
We've already mentioned several ways to create a new StockChartsACP chart from other places on the StockCharts site, but you can also create a new chart from within StockChartsACP:
Using the Symbol Box. Type in a ticker symbol to launch a chart for the new symbol, using the chart settings of the current chart.
Using the Symbol Selection Menu. Click on a ticker symbol link from one of your ChartLists, from scan results, from the Market Summary, SCTRs lists, and more. All of these sidebar panels are available from the Symbol Selection Menu on the right side of ACP.
Adding Multiple Charts to ACP Layouts. Use the plus icon next to the Symbol Box to add a new chart panel to your layout, or select one of the existing panels and enter a symbol in the Symbol Box to update the symbol for that panel. Sync Mode allows you to update the symbol for several chart panels in your layout at once.
Note: Only StockCharts members can add chart panels in StockChartsACP. Free users will be limited to a single-chart layout.
Learn More: Creating ACP Charts | Multi-Chart Layouts
The StockChartsACP viewing features help you to:
Move around the chart. Scroll back and forth in time, or zoom in to a specific segment of the chart.
Resize the chart. View the chart in full-screen mode, temporarily enlarge a single chart in a multi-chart layout, or use Fit-to-Window mode to ensure that all parts of the chart are shown on the screen without scrolling.
Refresh or view data on the chart. Auto-refresh chart data, use Crosshairs to view price and indicator values for a specific bar, or use the Measurement Tool to determine the price change, percentage gain, or the timeframe between any two bars.
Learn More: Viewing ACP Charts
Your StockChartsACP charts can be easily shared with others. Use Permalinks to send a chart link, download an image file of a chart, or use our print functionality to create a paper copy.
Learn More: Printing and Sharing ACP Charts
With StockChartsACP, you can customize your charts to meet your investing needs. StockCharts offers three main types of customization:
Editing individual chart settings.
Using a ChartStyle for quickly configuring a chart.
Adding custom annotations to the chart.
This section will briefly overview the customizations you can make to your StockChartsACP charts. Please see our Editing StockChartsACP Charts article in the Support Center for more detailed instructions.
From the Basic Chart Settings menu at the top of the screen, you can change the chart's symbol and set the period, range, and chart type.
If you click on the Chart Settings icon in the Chart Design menu on the left, you can access a wealth of other chart settings. Add and configure indicators and overlays for your chart in the panel that slides out.
At the top of the Chart Settings panel, you see the position of all indicators and overlays currently in use on the chart.
Click the symbol name or gear icon above the chart outline to customize your charts or change any chart settings. You can change the chart scale, chart header (quote), legend, color scheme, price and event labels, and more from here. Mouse over an indicator in the chart outline and click the indicator name or gear icon to change the settings for that indicator. To access these settings, you can also click on the symbol or indicator name in the chart's legend.
Indicator panels can be moved above or below the chart (or added to the main price plot as an overlay) by clicking and dragging on the legend for that indicator panel. Panels can also be moved by clicking the “equals sign” icon next to the indicator name in the chart outline and dragging the indicator to the desired position.
The color scheme of your chart can be changed by accessing the Color Schemes menu and clicking a button. Click the Paint Can icon in the Chart Design menu, then select from dozens of stylish color schemes.
Learn More: Editing StockChartsACP Charts
StockChartsACP Chart Templates can help streamline your chart-creation process if you repeatedly use the same chart settings. A brief overview of Chart Templates is provided here; please see our StockChartsACP Chart Templates article in the Support Center for more detailed instructions.
Chart Templates are collections of chart settings that can be used as “templates” for creating new charts or updating existing charts. A Chart Template specifies the chart's period, date range, chart type, color scheme, overlays, indicators—everything except the chart's symbol. Chart Templates help you configure all those settings in a snap.
StockCharts offers several predefined templates for your use. These styles are useful for trading strategies, chart timeframes, and trading styles. There are also templates of your favorite charting experts.
Click the Chart Templates icon in the Chart Design menu on the left.
Choose your desired template from the panel that pops out.
That style will be applied to the selected chart.
These predefined styles can be used as-is or serve as a starting point for creating your custom templates.
To create your own, simply configure a chart with all the desired chart settings, indicators, color schemes, etc., then click the green “Save Chart Template” button at the bottom of the Chart Templates panel. Your custom chart templates will be listed at the top of the panel.
Learn More: StockChartsACP Chart Templates
StockChartsACP offers annotation capabilities for your charts, including trendlines, shapes, text, and popular line studies such as Fibonacci retracement levels. You can access this functionality from the “pencil and ruler” icon on the Chart Design menu:
You can float or dock the annotation menu. The menu gives you access to several annotation or drawing tools. You can choose the annotation you want to draw and change the settings of the specific annotation (e.g., line color and width for trendlines, font color and size for text annotations, etc.). For most annotations, when you select the annotation, click and drag on the chart to draw the annotation.
At the bottom of the Annotations panel, you have several choices—snap the annotation to price, undo, delete, and save the annotations. There's also a help button that you can use to get quick annotation tips.
When you annotate a chart and save that chart to a ChartList, all your annotations are saved along with the chart.
Learn More: StockChartsACP Annotations
StockChartsACP charts can be saved into ChartLists, online “folders” that allow you to store up to 1000 charts in a single list. ChartLists allow you to group and organize your collections of saved charts for easy access. The basics of saving charts are covered here; please see our StockChartsACP ChartLists article in the Support Center for more detailed instructions on saving charts and using ChartLists.
Basic members can have one ChartList; Extra members can have up to 250 ChartLists; Pro members can have 500 ChartLists.
Click the Save button to save a chart to your ChartList. The current chart can be saved to your ChartList by clicking the Save icon at the top of your screen. You will be prompted to choose a ChartList and provide a name for the saved chart and the opportunity to add comments about the chart. Click on the blue "Continue" button below for a demo.
Click on the ChartLists icon at the top of the Symbol Selection menu on the right. This opens a panel showing your saved charts. Sort the list by clicking on one of the headers at the top of the list.
Click on a symbol to launch that saved chart.
To see a different ChartList, click the up/down arrow icon next to the ChartList name and select the desired ChartList.
At the bottom of this panel are buttons allowing you to add symbols to the current list, edit the current list, delete the current list, or create a new list. The blue button opens the List Drawer at the bottom of the screen. From this drawer, you can view more detailed information about the symbols in your ChartList on the Summary tab; view performance data for those symbols across multiple timeframes on the Performance tab; view and edit comments about your charts on the Chart Comments tab; view and edit notes about your ChartList on the List Notes tab; and edit the symbols on your ChartList on the Edit tab.
Your ChartLists in both the ChartLists panel and the List Drawer can be configured so that when the price changes for a symbol in the ChartList you are viewing, the symbol background will briefly flash red or green (depending on whether the price went down or up). Please see the Configuring StockChartsACP section of this document for more detailed instructions.
Learn More: StockChartsACP ChartLists
ACP can be configured to animate price changes on your ChartLists and certain panels on the Symbol Selection menu.
To enable this functionality, click on the help (question mark) icon at the top right of the screen and choose ACP Preferences:
Click the Animate Price Changes toggle to turn on this feature, then click the green Save Changes button.
Once this setting has been turned on, any price changes to symbols on ChartLists you're viewing will briefly flash either green when price increases or red when price decreases. The flashing price changes appear on the Market Summary and Market Movers panels, which you can access from the Symbol Summary menu.
Our plug-ins allow you to extend the functionality of StockChartsACP, adding specialized indicators to the platform. Both free and paid plug-ins are available, and more are always being added.
To add a StockChartsACP plug-in to your account, click the Plug-In Icon on the Platform Integrations menu at the bottom right. A panel will open up showing many of our plug-ins. Click the “Get the Plug-In” button for more information on a specific plug-in, or click the “See All Plug-Ins” button at the bottom for a complete list.
Once you've found the plug-in you want to try, click the “Install Now” button (for free plug-ins) or “Buy Now” button (for paid plug-ins). Provide payment information for the paid plug-ins when prompted.
Note: When purchasing plug-ins, use the same email address you use for your StockCharts account so we know which account to install the plug-in on.
A popup window will let you know the plug-in has been successfully installed on your account. It will be available for immediate use when you re-launch StockChartsACP.
Learn More: StockChartsACP Plug-Ins
In addition to the tools for viewing, editing, and saving ACP charts, StockChartsACP also offers several tools that aren't directly related to the charts, but help enhance your chart analysis experience.
StockCharts now offers convenient trading from StockChartsACP through an extension from Tradier. Click the Tradier icon on the Platform Integrations menu at the bottom right. Log in to your Tradier broker account or set up a new account and link it to your StockCharts account.
Then you can view your portfolio and make trades from within StockChartsACP. Click on the Tradier icon to see a summary of accounts in the panel on the right. For details, click the “Open Trading Drawer” button at the bottom of the panel.
For assistance with setting up a Tradier brokerage account or making trades, please contact Tradier support directly.
If you're a StockCharts member, you can set price alerts for the symbols you watch without leaving ACP. These alerts will notify you when a symbol crosses above or below a specified price. Learn more about alerts in our Technical Alerts documentation in the Support Center.
Creating a price alert from ACP is simple.
Click the bell icon in the Chart Actions Menu at the bottom left of the screen.
This opens the Create Alert panel on the left side of ACP.
Fill in the following fields in the Create Alert panel to set your price alert:
Symbol. The price alert automatically uses the symbol of the selected chart.
Trigger. Choose whether you want to be alerted when the price crosses above or below the specified price.
Price. There are two ways to fill the Price field. You can either type in the desired price or hover your mouse over the chart and click on the price you want to set your alert. The crosshairs are automatically turned on when you open the Create Alert panel; this can help you determine the exact price level to click on.
Message. Here, you can enter any message you'd like StockCharts to include when the alert is triggered
Notification Type. You can choose to be alerted via email, text message, or website notification when the specified price level is reached. Click the Update Phone Number link to change the mobile number where you receive text alerts.
To save your alert, click the green Save Alert button at the bottom of the panel. You can now manage your price alerts in the Alert Center. To access the Alert Center, click the grey View Your Alerts button at the bottom of the panel.
Note: If you have chosen a website for your alert's notification type, you can see these notifications in ACP.
Click the double bell icon in the Symbol Selection menu on the right. In the Alerts panel that opens, any alert notifications will be displayed in the Your Alerts section on this panel.
Tip: In ACP, you can configure your chart to show a horizontal line indicator on your chart wherever you've set a custom price alert. To enable this feature, go to the Chart Settings panel and check the “Display Price Alerts” checkbox near the bottom of the panel. You can also customize the color and style of this horizontal line.
Learn More: Technical Alerts
Available in the Drawer below the chart, the Sector Summary helps do a top-down analysis of the market. By default, you can view all 11 S&P sectors and their performance. The dropdown menu on the right shows you the different analysis periods—intraday, end-of-day, one-week, one month, three-month, six-month, YTD, and one year. You could also view the data by sector.
Want to drill down into each sector? Just click on the sector’s name to see a summary of the various industry groups within the selected sector. Click on any industry group’s name, and you’ll see a display of the stocks that make up the industry group. You can choose to hide stocks that are under $1 using the related button.
Members who have purchased a subscription to the OptionsPlay Add-on can also access the OptionsPlay Explorer tool to research the best options strategies for a particular stock, customize the strategy to fit their time horizon and risk profile, then copy detailed trade plans to their brokerage account.
To access the OptionsPlay Explorer from ACP, load the options chain for the ticker symbol you want to assess, then open the drawer and choose the Options tab. Click the OptionsPlay button at the top of the drawer to launch the OptionsPlay Explorer
Note: Members who have not subscribed to the OptionsPlay Add-On can still see the OptionsPlay Explorer, but will only be able to analyze AAPL, not any other ticker symbol.
Learn More: OptionsPlay Add-On | OptionsPlay Explorer
In the demo below, click through to see how you can access research tools in StockChartsACP, including Market Summary, reports, and more.
On the right side of the chart, click the globe icon to expand the Market Summary overview, and you can subsequently expand and collapse other reports by clicking on the carat (^) icon. To close out the research tools, click the X icon in the top right corner.
