LESSON 01 OF 13 · START WITH THE STRUCTURE

The five lines, at a glance

Original schematic · For learning, not a market forecast.

Ichimoku Kinko Hyo means “one glance equilibrium chart.” Developed by Goichi Hosoda, it brings several views of market balance into one chart. Start by identifying the lines before looking for signals.

Line	Calculation	Role
Tenkan sen	(9 bar highest high + lowest low) ÷ 2	Short term midpoint
Kijun sen	(26 bar highest high + lowest low) ÷ 2	Medium term midpoint
Senkou Span A	(Tenkan + Kijun) ÷ 2, shifted forward	One cloud boundary
Senkou Span B	(52 bar highest high + lowest low) ÷ 2, shifted forward	The other cloud boundary
Chikou Span	Current closing price, shifted backward	Comparison with past price

Keep calculation and placement separate

Lookback windows include the current bar. The shaded area between A and B is the Kumo, or cloud. Forward placement does not supply future price data.

A counting detail that matters. This series follows the Japanese inclusive “26th bar” convention: today is bar 1, so displacement is 25 bar intervals. Some platforms describe or implement a 26 interval shift. Check your indicator’s actual displacement before comparing charts. The 9/26/52 lookbacks are unchanged.

On an hourly chart, count bars rather than calendar days. The same numbers represent different amounts of elapsed time.

Check your understanding

A 9 bar high is 120 and its low is 100. What is Tenkan sen?

Reveal the explanation

110. It is the range midpoint; it is not the average of the nine closes.

Further reading: Kojiro’s Japanese Ichimoku lesson 01. This English lesson and its diagram were independently written and created by Ichimoku Master.

Explore related topics

Kei with the original Japanese Ichimoku books

AUTHOR

Kei

Kei is a Japanese forex trader and mentor who has traded since 2013. He teaches Ichimoku in English from the original Japanese texts, with a focus on chart analysis, trading psychology and risk management.

More about Kei →