Opening Range Indicator: Formula, Settings and How to Read It
Opening Range plots the high and the low of the first N minutes of each session, with 15 minutes as the default. Once that window closes the two levels are frozen and projected forward across the rest of the session, extending to the right edge for the session currently in progress.
Senzoukria · Indicators · Updated September 2026
Opening Range ships with the Senzoukria desktop app, in the Structure & sessions group of the indicator catalogue. It is drawn on the price chart.
What Opening Range measures
A bar belongs to the window when its bucket starts before the session open plus N minutes, and the duration is chosen from 5, 15, 30 or 60 minutes. After the window ends the levels no longer move, however far price travels afterwards — that fixity is what makes them a reference. If a session has no loaded bar inside its opening window, which happens when history is still loading mid-session, no level is drawn at all, because a partial range would be a false level presented as a real one. This is distinct from the Initial Balance, which is the 60-minute TPO convention and has its own indicator; selecting 60 minutes here reproduces the same duration.
The formula, as implemented
This is not a description of how the indicator is usually defined elsewhere — it is what the shipped code computes, documented next to the implementation:
Opening Range : high/low des N PREMIÈRES minutes de session (bucket start < open + N min), FIGÉS ensuite et projetés jusqu'à la fin de session (bord droit pour la session courante). N ∈ {5, 15, 30, 60}, défaut 15 — l'OR classique des day traders indices. Distinct de l'Initial Balance (60 min, convention TPO — `initial-balance`, profiles.ts). Session sans aucune barre dans la fenêtre (chargement en cours de séance) → pas de niveau : un range partiel serait un mensonge.
How to read it
- Each session shows two horizontal lines — the highest and lowest price of its opening window.
- Price trading outside either line means the session has extended beyond the range it established at the open.
- The width of the opening range relative to recent sessions is a reading in itself: a wide one describes an active open, a narrow one a hesitant start.
- A session that spends the whole day inside its opening range is a different kind of day from one that leaves it in the first hour and never returns.
- The levels are frozen, so a later move does not redraw them — what you see mid-afternoon is exactly what the opening window produced.
Parameters and defaults
The duration is a choice between 5, 15, 30 and 60 minutes, defaulting to 15 — the opening range classically used by index day traders. Shorter windows give narrower ranges that price breaches more often; 60 minutes reproduces the initial balance duration, so if you already run the Initial Balance indicator, pick one or the other to avoid drawing the same levels twice. The colour defaults to #26c6da.
| Parameter | Type | Default | Range |
|---|---|---|---|
| Duration (min) | choice | 15 min | 5 min, 15 min, 30 min, 60 min |
What it does not show
These are two prices taken from the opening window and nothing stands behind them: no volume, no resting liquidity, so a line does not indicate what is available at that price. They require the chart's session definition and the opening bars in loaded history; without them, nothing is drawn. On continuously traded crypto series the session open is a convention rather than an exchange event, and the range inherits that convention. A single headline in the first minute can set an opening range with little relation to the rest of the day. And a break of the range is an observation about price, not a statement about what follows.
Using it in Senzoukria
Add it from the Indicators panel of any footprint chart or candle chart. It runs on futures data from Rithmic or Databento and on crypto pairs from Binance and Bybit, on the same engine — the calculation does not change with the venue, only the data feeding it does. Market data subscriptions are billed by the provider, separately from the app.
Related indicators
- Session High/Low — Structure & sessions
- IB Extensions — Structure & sessions
- Classic Pivots — Structure & sessions
- Camarilla Pivots — Structure & sessions
- Naked POC — Structure & sessions
- Session Mid — Structure & sessions
See the full indicator library, or start with the order flow guide if you are new to reading aggression, delta and absorption.
Frequently asked questions
- What is the opening range in trading?
- The opening range is the high and low established during the first minutes of a trading session, most often the first 15 or 30 minutes. Traders use it as a reference because it captures where the session's initial two-way auction settled before the day developed. Once the window closes the levels are fixed and carried forward for the rest of the session.
- What is the difference between the opening range and the initial balance?
- They are the same kind of measurement over different windows and from different traditions. The initial balance is the first 60 minutes of the session and comes from the Market Profile TPO convention; the opening range is typically shorter, 15 minutes by default here, and comes from index day-trading practice. Setting this indicator to 60 minutes produces the same two levels as the initial balance, so there is no reason to run both that way.
- Does the opening range keep updating during the session?
- No. The high and low are taken from the opening window only, and once that window has passed they are frozen for the rest of the session, no matter how far price travels afterwards. Only the line's horizontal extension moves, reaching the right edge of the chart for the session in progress.