Vortex Indicator: Formula, Settings and How to Read It
The Vortex indicator plots two lines, VI+ and VI-, built from how far each bar reaches above the previous bar's low and below the previous bar's high, each divided by the summed true range of the window. The default period is 14.
Senzoukria · Indicators · Updated September 2026
Vortex ships with the Senzoukria desktop app, in the Momentum group of the indicator catalogue. It is drawn in its own panel below the chart.
What Vortex measures
VM+ is the absolute distance between the current high and the previous low, which captures upward reach measured from the prior bar's floor; VM- is the distance between the current low and the previous high, the downward reach from its ceiling. Both are accumulated with plain rolling sums over the period, not with Wilder's smoothing, which is what the 2010 article specifies and what makes the two lines respond directly to the last N bars and nothing older. Dividing each sum by the summed true range of the same window makes both lines dimensionless, so values on different instruments are directly comparable. If the summed true range over the window is zero, no value is produced for that bar.
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:
Vortex (Botes & Siepman, 2010) — sommes GLISSANTES de N (pas de Wilder) : VM+ = |high − lowₚ| ; VM− = |low − highₚ| VI+ = ΣVM+ / ΣTR ; VI− = ΣVM− / ΣTR ΣTR = 0 (fenêtre sans range) → null. Défaut N=14 (l'article original). Sorties : [VI+, VI−].
How to read it
- VI+ above VI- means upward reach has dominated the window; the reverse holds when VI- is on top. The lines describe the last N bars, not the next one.
- A crossing marks the bar where the balance of reach changed. Crossings are frequent inside ranges, where the two lines stay wound around each other.
- The gap between the lines matters as much as their order: a wide, stable separation describes a one-directional window, while a narrow one describes an indecisive one.
- Both lines sitting near 1 means the average reach in each direction is close to the average true range of the window.
- Segments with no value mark windows in which the bars had no range at all.
Parameters and defaults
The period defaults to 14, the value used in the original article, and accepts 1 to 200. A shorter period makes the sums react to each new bar more strongly and multiplies the crossings; a longer one produces a calmer picture that changes order later. The two colour settings only control how VI+ and VI- are drawn.
| Parameter | Type | Default | Range |
|---|---|---|---|
| Period | number | 14 | 1 – 200 |
What it does not show
The calculation reaches back to the previous bar's extremes, so anything that separates two consecutive bars distorts it: a session gap or a reopening produces a large VM value that corresponds to no continuous trading. Neither line uses volume at any point. In sideways conditions the two cross repeatedly with no directional content, and rolling sums have hard edges, so one influential bar leaves the calculation abruptly when it drops out of the window. On bars built by tick or volume count, the fourteen-bar window spans a different amount of clock time from one part of the session to another.
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
- Williams %R — Momentum
- Momentum — Momentum
- MFI — Momentum
- TSI — Momentum
- ADX/DMI — Momentum
- Linear Regression Slope — Momentum
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 do VI+ and VI- mean on the Vortex indicator?
- VI+ is the sum of the distances between each bar's high and the previous bar's low, divided by the summed true range of the same window. VI- is the equivalent measure downward, using each bar's low against the previous bar's high. When VI+ is the higher of the two, upward reach has dominated the last fourteen bars.
- Does the Vortex indicator use Wilder smoothing?
- No. This implementation uses plain rolling sums over the period, as described in the 2010 article that introduced the indicator. That is a deliberate difference from indicators such as ADX, which apply Wilder's recursive averaging and therefore retain older bars much longer.
- What period should I use for the Vortex indicator?
- The default of 14 comes from the original publication. Shorter periods make the two lines cross more often and earlier, longer ones make crossings rarer and later. There is no period that is correct in general; pick one and compare its behaviour against the bar interval and the instrument you actually watch.