A practical guide to customising MT4 price charts, timeframes and visual settings to support clearer and more effective market analysis.
Basic chart settings in MT4 (MetaTrader 4)
This article provides an overview of the basic chart settings available in MT4 to help you tailor the platform to your requirements.
Changing the chart type in MT4
MT4 offers three types of price charts: bar chart, candlestick chart, and line chart. You can switch between them using the toolbar.
Changing the chart timeframe in MT4
You can also change the chart’s timeframe in the toolbar.
MT4 supports the following timeframes:
- M1: 1 minute
- M5: 5 minutes
- M15: 15 minutes
- M30: 30 minutes
- H1: 1 hour
- H4: 4 hours
- D1: Daily
- W1: Weekly
- MN: Monthly
Zooming in and out in MT4
When you open a new chart in MT4, it is initially zoomed out, and candlesticks may appear as thin vertical lines. To improve visibility, use the magnifying glass icons (+) and (-) on the toolbar to zoom in or out to your preferred level.
To improve visibility, use the magnifying glass icons on the toolbar to zoom in to your preferred level.
Adjusting the visible price range in MT4
By default, MT4 automatically scales the chart to fit all candlesticks within the visible area. To manually adjust the price range (vertical scale), click and drag the vertical axis on the right side of the chart to expand or compress the scale. To reset to auto-scale, double-click the price axis.
Auto-scroll and chart shift in MT4
Auto-scroll
MT4 includes an auto-scroll function that automatically moves the chart to display the most recent candlestick whenever the price updates.
While useful for monitoring real-time price action, it may interfere with historical analysis, as the chart keeps jumping to the latest bar.
To disable auto-scroll, click the auto-scroll button on the toolbar.
Chart shift
The 'Chart Shift' function adds a blank space to the right-hand side of the chart, allowing for a clearer view of potential future price movements. Click the 'Chart Shift' button located next to the 'Auto Scroll' button to enable this feature. You can drag the small grey triangle at the top of the chart to adjust the width of this space.
Using the chart properties window in MT4
Right-click anywhere on the chart to open the properties window.
From here, you can customise chart colours and access a range of general settings under the "Common" tab:
- Offline chart: Stops price updates and sets the chart to offline mode. Useful for conducting focused analysis.
- Chart on foreground: Displays the chart in front of other elements.
- Shift end of chart from right border: Activates the chart shift function described above.
- Auto-scroll: Enables the auto-scroll feature.
- Scale fix One to One / Scale fix: Locks the vertical scale of the chart.
- Bar chart / Candlesticks / Line chart: Allows you to choose the chart type.
- Show OHLC: Displays the Open, High, Low, and Close prices at the top of the chart.
- Show Ask line: Displays the Ask price line in addition to the default Bid price.
- Show period separators: Inserts vertical lines to separate specific time periods—daily for M1 to H1, weekly for H4, monthly for D1, and yearly for W1 and MN.
- Show grid: Displays grid lines on the chart.
- Show volumes: Displays tick volume data (number of ticks) for each candlestick.
- Show object descriptions: Displays descriptions for trend lines and other drawing tools.
Adjusting these settings ensures your workspace is optimised for your specific trading strategy.
Make the required adjustments here to suit your preferred chart appearance and analysis style.
This article and its contents are intended for educational purposes only and should not be considered trading advice.
