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What is the meaning of resistance and support?

Support and Resistance Levels Explained

'Support' and 'resistance' are terms for two respective levels on a price chart that appear to limit the market's range of movement. The support level is where the price regularly stops falling and bounces back up, while the resistance level is where the price normally stops rising and dips back down.

1. Historical price data
The most reliable source for identifying support and resistance levels is historical prices, making them invaluable to traders. The key is to familiarise yourself with past patterns – sometimes from very recent activity – so you can recognise them if they appear again. However, it is important to remember that past patterns may have formed under different circumstances, so they are not always a reliable indicator.

2. Previous support and resistance levels

You can use previous notable support or resistance levels as markers for possible entry and exit points, as well as indicators of future movement. It's important to note that major support and resistance levels are rarely exact figures. It's unusual for a market to hit exactly the same price time after time before reversing, so it's probably more useful to think of them as support or resistance zones.

3. Technical indicators

Technical indicators or trendlines – such as the ones covered later in this article – can provide dynamic support or resistance levels that move as the chart progresses. Support and resistance levels for different markets will often be based on different factors, so developing the ability to recognise which levels are going to impact a market’s price can take time. For that reason, it is important to practise identifying support or resistance levels using historical charts.

How to draw support and resistance lines

To draw support and resistance lines on a chart, you first have to find them by using one of the following methods:

Peaks and troughs

Support and resistance levels from a previous time frame
Moving averages
Trend lines
These are covered in detail in the sections that follow. To establish the strength of the support and resistance lines, you can combine these methods.