Best Free MT4 Buy Sell Indicators: The Settings That Tested Best
Key takeaways
- You do not need to download anything. MT4 ships with the two arrow logics that scored best in my test — Fractals and ZigZag — and they are three clicks away in the Navigator.
- The default settings are the wrong ones. Out of the box ZigZag produces a dense, fast chart that lost money in testing; widening it to roughly a 25 pip swing cut the arrows from 785 to 93 and took the result from -0.05 to +4.04 pips per trade.
- Set the hold, not just the entry. Every arrow tested was flat or negative at 30 minutes and only turned positive at four hours. If your platform habit is to close within the hour, no setting on this page will help.
- Before any downloaded arrow file goes on a live chart, run the two-screenshot repaint check — 60 seconds now, versus discovering later that 85.5% of the arrows you traded were erased from your own history.
This is the practical half of the arrow question. I have already published what the arrows pay — four free buy sell logics tested over 16,926 EURUSD bars — and why the good-looking ones look good — repainting measured in pips. This page is what to put on the chart in MetaTrader 4, with which numbers in which boxes, and how to check anything you download.
Do I need to download a buy sell indicator at all?
Probably not. Of the four arrow logics I tested, three are already inside MT4:
- Fractals — Navigator, Indicators, Bill Williams, Fractals. The most common arrow file on the free market is this, repackaged with a bigger graphic.
- ZigZag — Navigator, Indicators, Custom, ZigZag. Its swing points are what most “reversal arrow” products mark.
- Moving average crosses — two Moving Average instances on the chart. The arrow adds nothing the crossing lines do not already show.
The fourth, an RSI plus Stochastic confluence, needs both oscillators in separate windows. It was also the second worst performer, so it is not the one to chase. If you are new to the platform and Navigator is not open yet, my MT4 first chart guide covers the six decisions that come before any of this, and how to install an MT4 indicator covers the download route if you go there anyway.
Which settings tested best?
My tests were run on coded logic with a clean pip threshold rather than on the MT4 files themselves, so treat these as the nearest platform equivalent, not a bit-for-bit match. The direction of travel is what matters, and it is unambiguous: slower is better.
| Indicator | MT4 defaults | What tested better | Result at 4h hold |
|---|---|---|---|
| ZigZag | Depth 12, Deviation 5, Backstep 3 | Depth 36, Deviation 250, Backstep 5 | +4.04 pips, 55.7% |
| ZigZag (middle) | — | Depth 24, Deviation 150, Backstep 3 | +1.85 pips, 52.4% |
| Fractals | no inputs | use as is, hold 4 hours | +1.80 pips, 51.2% |
| EMA cross | 5 and 20 | nothing helped | -0.36 pips, 47.9% |
The Deviation field is the one that matters and the one nobody touches. It is measured in points, not pips, so on a five-digit broker 250 points is 25 pips — that is the setting that produced the only clearly profitable column in the whole study. On a four-digit broker use 25. Getting that unit wrong by a factor of ten is the most common reason a “recommended setting” from a forum does nothing on your chart.
What does each ZigZag input actually do?
- Depth — the minimum number of bars back that must contain no better extreme. Higher means fewer, larger swings. At 12 on M5 you are marking noise; at 36 you are marking something a person would call a swing.
- Deviation — how far, in points, price must retrace before a swing is accepted. This is the real threshold, and it is also your entry penalty: at 250 points, the arrow is confirmed about 25 pips away from where it is drawn.
- Backstep — the minimum bars between two accepted extremes. It cleans up clusters and does not change the economics much.
Because Deviation is both the filter and the lateness, widening it is a genuine trade-off and not a free lunch: you get better arrows and you get them later. In this dataset the improvement outran the penalty all the way to 25 pips, which is where I stopped.
How do I check a downloaded arrow file before trusting it?
- Attach it to a demo chart and screenshot the last 30 bars with the clock visible.
- Wait for ten M5 bars. Under an hour.
- Screenshot the same region. If any arrow moved, disappeared or appeared where there was none, it repaints. That is the whole test.
- Open Strategy Tester in visual mode (Ctrl+R, pick the indicator’s EA if one ships with it, or simply step a chart forward) and watch when arrows commit.
- Measure the lateness in pips between the arrow’s bar and the bar you first saw it. Subtract that from every promise the product page makes.
For the record: Fractals repaint mildly, ZigZag repaints heavily, moving average crosses do not repaint at all. A file whose description says “non repaint” while its logic marks swing highs and lows is describing an aspiration.
How should I trade the arrows once they are on the chart?
Three platform habits did more for the numbers than any input field.
- Hold four hours, not thirty minutes. Every arrow in the study was flat or negative at 30 minutes. Set the target and the stop when you enter and then leave the terminal, because sitting in front of a 5-minute chart for four hours is how good trades get closed early.
- Give the stop room to match the entry. An arrow that arrives 25 pips late cannot live behind a 10 pip stop. My stop loss distance test put real numbers on where the noise band sits on this pair, and fixed stops against ATR stops covers which kind to use.
- Trade the hours the spread allows. The best arrow here made about 4 pips per trade. That margin does not survive a wide spread, and spread and swap costs on MT4 shows exactly when EURUSD gets expensive.
Two more things worth switching off. Any arrow product bundled with an alert on every M5 bar will train you to overtrade, which is the same failure I described in my ADX guide. And do not run two arrow indicators together hoping for confirmation: the RSI plus Stochastic confluence in my test was a confirmation stack, and it finished at 43.8%.
MT5 users
Everything above applies unchanged. Fractals and ZigZag are both standard in MT5 with the same three inputs and the same units, and Deviation is still in points. The platform differences that do matter are elsewhere — timeframes and order handling — which I went through in MT4 vs MT5 in 2026.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best free buy sell indicator for MT4?
On my data, ZigZag with a widened Deviation, used as a swing marker and held for hours rather than minutes: 55.7% wins and +4.04 pips per trade. It is built into MT4, so there is nothing to download and nothing to pay.
What are the best ZigZag settings for MT4?
Depth 36, Deviation 250 points on a five-digit broker (25 on a four-digit one), Backstep 5, on the M5 chart. That produced roughly one arrow per day instead of one per hour, and it was the only combination that was clearly profitable before costs.
Where do I find buy sell arrows in MT4?
Navigator panel, Indicators section. Fractals sit under Bill Williams, ZigZag under Custom. Drag either onto the chart. If you cannot see the Navigator, press Ctrl+N, and if you have not installed the platform yet, start with downloading and installing MT4.
Are arrow indicators good for beginners?
They are attractive to beginners for the wrong reason — the arrow removes the decision, and the decision is where the learning is. If you are choosing a first toolkit, my starter set is a better place to begin than an arrow file.
Why do the settings I found on a forum not work on my chart?
Usually the points-versus-pips unit on Deviation, sometimes a different timeframe, occasionally a different broker digit count. Check all three before concluding the settings are wrong.
Want a clean indicator to install right now?
It is my own enhanced DeMARK Trend Line indicator for MetaTrader 4 and 5. Non repaint, clean, and free.
Forex educator and indicator developer. I build and trade my own MetaTrader tools, and share the ones that genuinely help.