What is the hammer pattern?
The hammer is a bullish candlestick pattern. A small body at the top of the range with a long lower shadow, after a decline. Sellers pushed price down and lost it all back.
How to spot a hammer
- 1Confirm price has been falling into the candle.
- 2Look for a small body near the top of the range.
- 3The lower shadow should be at least twice the body, with little upper shadow.
How does the hammer form?
After a decline, a bar trades well below its open and then recovers almost all of it, closing near the high. What remains is a small body with a long lower shadow.
How do you confirm a hammer?
The lower wick should be roughly twice the body or longer, and the close should sit in the upper part of the range. A short wick makes it an ordinary bar.
When does the hammer fail?
A hammer into a level that has already broken tends to fail: the rejection is real but there is nothing underneath to hold it, and the next bar simply takes out the low.
No chart pattern works every time. The examples on this page were chosen because they show the pattern clearly, and in real markets patterns fail often.
Practice on real charts
3 real examples of the hammer, cut off where the pattern completed. Make your call, then see what happened.
The shaded area is a hammer. Where did price go next?
Hammer: common questions
Is the hammer bullish or bearish?
The hammer is bullish. The longer the lower wick relative to the body, the more decisive the rejection.
How do you spot a hammer?
Confirm price has been falling into the candle. Look for a small body near the top of the range. The lower shadow should be at least twice the body, with little upper shadow.
What is the difference between the hammer and the hanging man?
The hammer: A small body at the top of the range with a long lower shadow, after a decline. Sellers pushed price down and lost it all back. The hanging man: The hammer's shape, but after a rally. The long lower wick shows selling appeared for the first time.
How reliable is the hammer?
No chart pattern works every time. A hammer into a level that has already broken tends to fail: the rejection is real but there is nothing underneath to hold it, and the next bar simply takes out the low. That is why it helps to wait for confirmation and to practice on many real examples before relying on it.
How can I practice spotting the hammer?
Use the real charts on this page: each one stops where the hammer completed, so you can make a call and then see what happened. The free Chartle app mixes the hammer in with 48 other patterns in short daily sessions.
Keep learning
- Chart pattern gameGuess where price goes next on real charts, all 49 patterns mixed.
- All 49 chart patternsEvery bullish and bearish pattern, with a printable cheat sheet.
- How to read candlestick chartsBodies, wicks and colors explained from the start.
- Cheat sheet PDFAll patterns on two printable pages.
