# Trend Lines

> Draws automatic trend lines from the turning points of the smoothed price and follows each one until price breaks away from it.

Updated: 2026-10-25T01:30:08.000Z · https://chartrider.com/docs/indicators/trend-lines/

## What you see
- Thin lines that start at a peak or a trough of the price. Lines built from peaks (resistance) and lines built from troughs (support) are drawn the same way.
- Intact lines are grey and run to the latest close. A line that price has broken ends at the close of the breaking candle: green for a break up through a peak line, red for a break down through a trough line.
- A line in Line Color for the smoothed price the turning points are taken from. With Period (DEMA) at 1 it simply follows the closes.

If no trend line qualifies, the turning points themselves are shown as dots, red for peaks and green for troughs.

## How it works
The close is smoothed with a DEMA and its peaks and troughs are found. Peaks are paired with lower peaks and troughs with higher troughs; the line through each pair is projected to the right candle by candle. It counts as broken when a close moves beyond the projection by more than Trend Line Deviation %. Lines whose length in candles falls outside Min / Max Trend Line length are discarded.

## How to read it
In active markets many lines overlap, especially over the most recent candles. Focus on long lines that started at clear turning points. Breaks through a line that held for a long time carry more weight than breaks of short ones. Raise Min Trend Line length to hide short lines and lower the deviation to have lines end sooner.

## Using it in strategies
The output `value` is the smoothed price line (the DEMA of the close), not a trend line – the lines themselves are not available as outputs. In [WickScript](https://chartrider.com/docs/wickscript/): `use indicator "Trend Line Indicator" with DEMAPeriod 5 as tl`, then `tl.value`. For the [Trade Setup](https://chartrider.com/docs/strategies/trade-setup/) it behaves like a moving average.

## Settings

Open the settings with the slider icon next to the indicator (Indicators, `F3`). Numeric settings can be swept as Step 1 / Step 2 parameters when you run a strategy.

### Inputs

| Setting | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Period (DEMA) | Number | `1` | Smoothing of the close before turning points are searched. 1 = no smoothing; larger values ignore small wiggles. (min 1) |
| Min. Range (High/Low) | Number | `3` | Minimum number of candles between two consecutive peaks (or troughs). (min 2) |
| Max. Range (High/Low) | Number | `5` | How many candles before a point it has to stand out against to count as a peak or trough. (min 2) |
| Min Trend Line length | Number | `2` | Shortest line that is kept, in candles. (min 2) |
| Max Trend Line length | Number | `80` | Longest line that is kept, in candles. (min 2) |
| Trend Line Deviation % | Number | `3.5` | How far, in percent, a close must move beyond the projected line to break it. (min 0) |

### Styles

| Setting | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Line Color | Color | `#b5b6b6` |  |

## Outputs

These values can be used in Trade Setup triggers, filters and exits (see [Trade Setup](https://chartrider.com/docs/strategies/trade-setup/)) and in WickScript.

| Output | In WickScript | Description |
|---|---|---|
| value | `value` | The smoothed close (DEMA) used to find the turning points. |

## Use in WickScript

`use indicator` creates this indicator inside a script, with settings by their ID. Each output is a field of the name after `as`. See [WickScript indicators](https://chartrider.com/docs/wickscript/indicators/).

```wickscript
wickscript 1
indicator "Trend Lines from the list" on chart
use indicator "Trend Line" with DEMAPeriod 1 as myTrendline
show myTrendline.value as line "value"
```