Tick feed filtering: not every price change reaches your chart
Posted: Sat Oct 31, 2026 7:33 pm
Brokers don't necessarily pass every tick they receive. Some feeds throttle or filter updates, sending a subset to retail clients, especially during high-activity periods.
Consequences for scalpers vary. A chart might look smoother than the real market. Short spikes may never appear. An expert advisor that relies on tick events may miss changes that actually happened on the server.
It also means that two brokers can show visibly different charts at the same moment, even when prices are close. One might show a spike that the other filtered out.
There's no easy way to see the full feed, but comparing tick counts per minute between brokers on the same pair gives an idea. A big difference in tick rate suggests filtering.
For strategies that depend on micro-movements, this matters more than most people expect.
Anyone compared tick counts between brokers, and what did they find?
Consequences for scalpers vary. A chart might look smoother than the real market. Short spikes may never appear. An expert advisor that relies on tick events may miss changes that actually happened on the server.
It also means that two brokers can show visibly different charts at the same moment, even when prices are close. One might show a spike that the other filtered out.
There's no easy way to see the full feed, but comparing tick counts per minute between brokers on the same pair gives an idea. A big difference in tick rate suggests filtering.
For strategies that depend on micro-movements, this matters more than most people expect.
Anyone compared tick counts between brokers, and what did they find?