By Harvest Wright, updated 27 October 2026
A liquidity sweep is a quick move through an obvious high or low that triggers the stop orders resting beyond it, followed by a reversal. Buy stops sit above old highs and equal highs, and sell stops sit below old lows and equal lows. When price runs those orders and then closes back inside the range, the move often has nothing left to feed on, and the other side takes over.
What is a liquidity sweep?
Every stop loss is a resting order. A trader who is long has a sell stop below the market, and a trader who is short has a buy stop above it. Large players need plenty of orders on the other side of their own, and clusters of stops provide exactly that. A liquidity sweep is price reaching into one of those clusters, filling against it, and turning around.
You will also hear it called a liquidity grab, a stop hunt or a run on stops. They all describe the same event. I like to think of liquidity as fuel on a road trip: sometimes price has to take a detour back to a level to fill up before it can carry on toward where it is really going.
In my experience price moves for two reasons, liquidity and efficiency. A sweep is the liquidity side. The efficiency side is price returning to fair value, such as a fair value gap, and the two often work together in the same move.
Where liquidity rests
Sweeps happen at levels that many traders can see at once. These are the ones I mark before every session:
- Old highs and lows on the timeframe you trade, especially swing points that held more than once.
- [Equal highs and equal lows](/learn/equal-highs-and-equal-lows-ict). Two or more highs at almost the same price look like strong resistance, which is exactly why stops pile up above them.
- The previous day's high and low.
- The [Asian session range](/learn/asian-session-range-trading). Its high and low are classic targets at the London open.
- Trend line touches. A clean trend line with several touches has stops lined up just beyond it.
What a liquidity sweep looks like on the chart
On your entry timeframe a sweep usually shows up as a wick through the level and a close back inside the range. The stops get triggered, the orders get filled, and the candle cannot hold beyond the level.
The wick alone is never enough for me. What turns a possible sweep into a setup is what happens next: a strong move away from the level that breaks a recent short term swing, ideally with displacement and a fair value gap left behind.
Liquidity sweep vs breakout
Every breakout starts by taking out a high or low, so the first push looks the same in both cases. These are the differences I look for:
- The close. A sweep closes back inside the range. A breakout closes beyond the level with full bodied candles.
- The retest. After a breakout, price often comes back to the level and holds it. After a sweep, price leaves the level behind.
- Structure. A sweep is followed by a break of a short term swing in the opposite direction. A breakout keeps making higher highs, or lower lows.
- The higher timeframe. If my daily bias is bullish and price runs a high, that is more likely expansion in my favour than a sweep to fade.
A liquidity run has to match the scale of the chart
This is a point I come back to on stream a lot. A run on liquidity has to be in proportion to the chart you are looking at. If a 4 hour chart has equal highs and price pokes one pip above them, very few stops have been taken. The liquidity is still sitting there, and price can come back for it.
Zoom the chart out to a sensible scale and ask whether the move through the level is meaningful compared with the swings around it. Real orders take time and distance to fill, so a tiny poke on a big chart is usually just noise.
How I trade a liquidity sweep: five checks
Before I fade a run on a high or low, it has to pass these checks, in this order:
- Name the pool before it gets taken. Mark the Asian high and low, the previous day's high and low, and clean equal highs or lows before the session opens. If you only find the level after price moves, you are fitting a story to the chart.
- Watch the close. On the entry timeframe, the candle that runs the level should close back inside the range. A close beyond it with a full body is a warning sign.
- Demand displacement back the other way. I want a strong move away from the swept level that breaks a recent swing. Without that shift in structure, the sweep is still only a theory.
- Check it against the daily bias. A sweep of highs fits best when the higher timeframe points lower and price is in premium. Fading a run that agrees with your bias means fighting the larger draw on liquidity. See daily bias and premium and discount.
- Define what proves you wrong. The stop goes beyond the sweep extreme. If that distance makes the position too small, or leaves the reward too thin, I skip the trade.
An example at the London open
Picture GBPUSD running the Asian high just after 08:00 London time. The 5 minute candle closes back below the high, then the next push down breaks the low that formed the run up. Now there is a sweep, a close back inside the range, and a shift in structure. If the daily chart also points lower, that is a setup worth considering.
The entry comes on the return into the fair value gap or order block left by the move down, rather than on the wick itself. Waiting for that return usually means a smaller stop and a clearer reason for being in the trade. For more on timing around the open, see my London open killzone guide.
Where the stop and target go
- Stop: beyond the extreme of the sweep. A fresh high after a high sweep, or a fresh low after a low sweep, means the idea is wrong.
- Entry: on the return into the fair value gap or order block left by the displacement.
- First target: the nearest obvious liquidity on the other side, such as the opposite end of the range or a recent swing. I like low-hanging fruit as a first target and let the rest run only when the higher timeframe supports it.
Common mistakes, and how to avoid getting swept yourself
The other half of understanding sweeps is making sure your own stop is not the liquidity. Most of the mistakes below are the reason retail stops get taken:
- Stops in the obvious place. A stop a few pips beyond equal highs or the previous day's high is exactly where a sweep goes. Give the trade room, or wait for the sweep to happen and use it.
- Fading every new high or low. Many runs are real breakouts. Without the close back inside and a shift in structure, there is no sweep to trade.
- Spotting the level after the fact. Mark liquidity before the session, or the analysis turns into hindsight.
- Treating tiny pokes as sweeps. Check the run against the scale of the chart.
- Ignoring the news. High impact releases spike through levels in both directions. I check the calendar before every session.
See sweeps in real time
I trade the London open live every weekday and call out the liquidity levels before price reaches them, so you can watch sweeps and breakouts play out as they happen. Times in your zone are on the live schedule.