The Best cTrader Indicators for Forex Traders

25 August 2020

Forex trading requires a lot of technical analysis in order to bring payouts, however, that same analysis can be quite hard. Because of this, trading software such as cTrader tends to have things called indicators that make it much easier for the average trader. Although there are a lot of custom cTrader indicators, there are still some that will prove to be more useful than others.

In this article, we will discuss 3 of the best indicators or at least the most popular ones that people have installed on their cTrader.

First is the Pivot Point indicator. This tool helps traders to find the most optimal price point of a financial instrument, which they can later use as a comparison basically. The indicator calculates what the most “stable” exchange rate is and then displays several price points where the price could potentially go and experience issues. These are the resistance and support levels. More on that later.

The second is the volumes tool, which is one of the best cTrader indicators for FX traders and beyond. This tool helps people calculate how much of a certain instrument is in circulation on the market. If the volume is higher than usual, it means that prices could rise. If it’s lower than usual, the prices may fall. But more detail about this later.

The third is the strength meter for currencies. This is more of a background tool rather than an active one, but we will get into it later on as well.

Finally, you will also learn how to find, download, and install these tools on your software as well.

How to add indicators in cTrader

Installing the indicators on your cTrader software is very easy if you know your way around the computer, but it may be quite complicated if you’re not too well versed in technology. But worry not, the process is simple enough to explain to everybody, so let’s try and break it down into several steps.

Steps for installing indicators on cTrader:

Download the indicators
Find the file you’ve downloaded
Find your cTrader folder
Copy/paste the indicator file into your cTrader > Indicators folder
Restart cTrader if you have it open

The best cTrader indicators download location is the cTrader website itself. The company behind this software learned from their competitors that providing tools from their own website has a much more positive effect for both producers and consumers of these tools.

In many cases, the indicators you will find on cTrader’s website have been tested and approved by professionals, meaning that you always get what you bargained for.

In most cases, the indicator you download from the cTrader website will automatically be installed on your software. But, if you download it from somewhere else, a manual installation may be required.

The most important thing you should focus on this guide to cTrader indicators is the location of the indicator file once you’ve downloaded it. It will most likely be either in your “Downloads” folder or on your desktop.
Once you’ve found it simply right-click on it and press copy. Later you will have to find the folder of your cTrader software, find the “Indicators” folder inside of it and just right click and press paste. The indicator will then display on your software once you’ve restarted.

Now that we’ve covered the installation process of the indicators, let’s talk about the indicators themselves.

cTrader support and resistance indicator

The support and resistance indicator, also known as the Pivot Points indicator is one of the most useful tools that a trader could have.
The role of this tool is to calculate the average closing prices of trading sessions way before today. The trader can decide how far back he or she wants the indicator to calculate. The most optimal number so far has seen to be a month or so.

Once this exchange rate is determined, the Pivot Point indicator then calculates the most likely price points the exchange could either drop or rise to. These are what we call the support and resistance levels. Support is for dropping and resistance is for rising.

Without a doubt, the Pivot Point tool is one of the best cTrader indicators for Forex traders out there right now.

The volume indicator

A volume indicator is a trading tool that helps people see the activity within the market. The reason why this is very important is that the market mostly works on the supply/demand basis. If there is a lot of supply but not that much demand, the prices will start going down, and if there’s a lot of demand but not enough supply the prices will start going up.

By looking at the volume provided by the indicator, traders can quickly understand what state the market is in right now. Is there a surplus of demand or supply? This is one of the many questions that the volume indicator helps answer.

When it comes to cTrader indicators comparison, it’s very hard to name the best tool, but so far volume is the most “relevant” tool in terms of trading. The reason is that it is the only thing that can find the real answer to market trading volumes. Calculating it manually is almost impossible.

For example. Imagine that there are 1000 people looking to buy 0.1 lot of USD/JPY each, but there is only one person selling 100 lots of USD/JPY. On the surface, it looks like there is more demand than supply because there are more buyers, right? Well, when looking at the volume it is immediately clear that the supply and demand are equal, so price movement is not very likely.

Strength Meter

The strength meter, as already mentioned in the intro is not necessarily an active best cTrader indicator for free that you can get. It is mostly a background tool that helps set your future analysis up rather than set your trades up.

The most basic explanation of the tool is that it helps you find what currencies are strong and which ones are weak on the FX market. For example, try to imagine the growth of the USD/JPY currency pair’s exchange rate. Sure there is growth, but why is there growth? Is it because USD is getting weaker or stronger? These questions are essential to be answered if you want your trade to always focus on a well-performing currency pair.

The strength meter has a 1-10 rating system. The higher the number, the stronger the currency is. The strength meter is used to pair strong currencies with weaker ones once the additional analysis has been done with other tools.

cTrader Forex trading indicators - Key takeaways

No matter how much we or others may try, there is no such thing as the best cTrader indicator. All of the tools that are available for the software can be very useful in certain situations. The only reason why we chose the three we’ve discussed in this article is that they can be used in almost every single scenario. When finding the best indicator for yourself, it will most likely be based on your own preferences.

Whenever you find an additional guide to cTrader indicators remember that “the best” means “ the most popular” rather than the actual best. As already mentioned, every indicator has a role in the market.

Most of the indicators you find for cTrader will be free, but there are other paid versions as well. These indicators will usually have several features combined into them and can prove to be useful. But unless you are 100% sure that you need that extra feature, it’s usually not a good idea to pay for an indicator.

FAQ on best free cTrader indicators

How many indicators can I install on cTrader?

There is pretty much no limit to how many indicators you can install on your software. But be aware that there is a finite number of these tools. Plus, it may not be the best choice to overload your list of indicators too much, because all the useful ones will be much harder to find and use.

Most traders add around 5 or 10 indicators to their software.

Are cTrader indicators better than MT4?

No, not necessarily. Every single indicator that is available for cTrader has an identical version on MT4. However, converting MT4 indicators to cTrader is mostly the route that many developers take when releasing a new tool. This is due to the number of traders using MT4 than anything else.

In the grand scheme of things, there is no difference at all.

Can I use MT4 indicators on cTrader?

No. MT4 and cTrader are two completely different pieces of software even though they serve the same purpose. These programs are written in different coding languages, which means that they need indicators and tools that are written in their own native language as well.

Your cTrader software will not be able to run an indicator designed for MT4. But there’s no need to worry. Every single indicator available for MT4 is also available for cTrader.

Why should I use indicators on cTrader and not MT4?

One main answer would be that the best cTrader indicators are available on cTrader alone, but that’s a very cliche answer. The real answer is that cTrader is much better than MT4 in terms of visuals. The design is much more modern, and the indicators are slightly easier to identify on the charts.

On MT4 most indicators simply look like a part of the chart and are therefore a bit harder to spot.

Are there default indicators on cTrader?

Yes. cTrader comes with 65 pre-installed indicators that you can access at any time. The developers made sure to include all of the most useful indicators on the base software as well, so if you have a very specific trading strategy, you may not even require downloading a new set of indicators at all.