OPEN-SOURCE SCRIPT
EMA Ribbon Trend Filter [StrixEDGE]
EMA Ribbon Trend Filter is a multi-layered trend analysis system built around a triple EMA ribbon (8/21/55) enhanced with squeeze detection, a composite momentum score, multi-timeframe confluence, and dynamic slope-adaptive coloring.
This is not another moving average overlay. It is a full trend diagnostics dashboard designed to answer five questions at a glance: what is the trend, how strong is it, how long has it been running, is the ribbon compressing toward a breakout, and do higher timeframes agree.
🔹 CORE CONCEPT
Three exponential moving averages — fast (8), mid (21), and slow (55) — form a visual ribbon on the chart. When the EMAs stack in order (fast > mid > slow), the trend is bullish. When they invert, the trend is bearish. Anything else is a transitional state labeled neutral.
The ribbon is more than directional. The distance between the fastest and slowest EMA (the "spread") measures trend strength as a percentage, and the rate at which the ribbon expands or contracts reveals momentum shifts before price confirms them.
🔹 WHAT MAKES THIS DIFFERENT
Most EMA ribbons stop at direction and color. This indicator adds four analytical layers that standard ribbons lack:
▸ Ribbon Squeeze Detection
The indicator continuously measures ribbon width against its own moving average. When the three EMAs converge below a configurable threshold (default: 30% of average width), the ribbon turns yellow and the dashboard flags an active squeeze. Compression precedes expansion — a squeeze ending often marks the start of a directional move. Dedicated markers appear on the chart when a squeeze releases into a bullish or bearish trend.
▸ Composite Momentum Score (0–100)
A single number synthesizing four components, each weighted equally at 25 points:
— EMA alignment: full bullish or bearish stack scores 25, mixed scores 0
— Slope agreement: all three EMAs rising or all falling scores 25, partial agreement scores 12
— Spread strength: scaled between 0–25 based on where the current spread falls relative to the user-defined weak and strong thresholds
— Price position: price above the ribbon in a bullish trend (or below in bearish) scores 25, inside the ribbon scores 10, on the wrong side scores 0
The score is color-coded: cyan (80+), teal (60–79), orange (40–59), red (below 40).
▸ Dynamic Slope-Adaptive Colors
When enabled, each EMA line independently changes color based on its own slope — rising EMAs render green, falling EMAs render red. This provides an early visual warning when individual EMAs begin to flatten or turn, even while the overall stack remains intact. A bullish stack where the slow EMA has turned red is a qualitatively different signal than one where all three are green.
▸ Multi-Timeframe Dashboard
A built-in table displays trend state, spread, and grade across five timeframes simultaneously: the current chart timeframe plus 15-minute, 1-hour, 4-hour, and daily. The active chart timeframe is marked with ► in the MTF rows if it matches one of the fixed timeframes. A confluence row at the bottom counts how many timeframes are bullish versus bearish and outputs a directional bias: Strong Bull (4–5 aligned), Bull Lean (3), Neutral (mixed), Bear Lean (3 bearish), or Strong Bear (4–5 bearish).
🔹 CROSSOVER SIGNAL HIERARCHY
Not all EMA crossovers carry equal weight. The indicator differentiates three tiers with distinct marker sizes and shapes:
▸ Fast × Mid (tiny triangles) — Early signal. The 8 EMA crossing the 21 EMA indicates short-term momentum shift. Frequent, noisy, best used as an alert rather than a trigger.
▸ Fast × Slow (standard triangles) — Confirmation signal. The 8 EMA crossing the 55 EMA has more significance and filters out minor pullbacks.
▸ Mid × Slow (diamonds) — Trend shift signal. The 21 EMA crossing the 55 EMA typically marks a genuine change in trend direction. This is the least frequent and most reliable crossover in the set.
All crossover markers can be toggled off independently.
🔹 DASHBOARD COMPONENTS
The top-right dashboard (position and size adjustable) contains:
Row 1 — TREND: Current trend state (▲ Bullish / ▼ Bearish / ◆ Neutral) with bar count showing how long the trend has been active.
Row 2 — ZONE: Where price sits relative to the ribbon (Above / Inside / Below) alongside the momentum score out of 100.
Row 3 — SQUEEZE: Active squeeze status with a visual strength bar (██████░░░░) showing current spread intensity relative to its recent range.
Rows 4–9 — MTF OVERVIEW: Trend, spread, and grade for the current chart, 15m, 1H, 4H, and 1D timeframes.
Row 10 — BIAS: Multi-timeframe confluence verdict with bull/bear count.
🔹 SETTINGS
EMA Settings
▸ Fast / Mid / Slow EMA Period — Default 8/21/55. Periods must be in ascending order.
▸ Source — Close, Open, High, Low, HL2, HLC3, or OHLC4.
Overlay Settings
▸ Background Transparency — Controls the intensity of the trend-colored chart background (0–99).
▸ Crossover Signals — Toggle the three-tier crossover markers.
▸ Ribbon Fill — Toggle the colored fill between EMA lines. Fill turns yellow during active squeeze.
▸ Dynamic EMA Colors — Toggle slope-based EMA coloring (green = rising, red = falling).
▸ Bar Coloring — Optional candle coloring by trend state and price position. Off by default.
▸ Squeeze Detection — Toggle squeeze markers and dashboard squeeze status.
Dashboard
▸ Table Size — Tiny, Small, Normal, or Large.
▸ Table Position — 8 positions (corners, centers, sides).
Thresholds
▸ Weak/Strong spread thresholds (%) — Define what constitutes a weak, moderate, or strong trend spread. These should be adjusted per asset class (e.g., lower for forex, higher for crypto).
▸ Squeeze Lookback — Number of bars used to calculate the average ribbon width for squeeze detection.
▸ Squeeze Ratio — The compression threshold. A ribbon narrower than this ratio × average width triggers a squeeze flag.
🔹 ALERTS
Nine configurable alert conditions:
▸ Bullish / Bearish EMA Crossover (any tier)
▸ Mid × Slow Bullish / Bearish Shift
▸ Bullish / Bearish Stack Formed
▸ Squeeze Detected (compression begins)
▸ Squeeze Released (expansion starts)
▸ High Momentum (score crosses above 80)
🔹 SUGGESTED USE
This indicator works as a trend filter, not a standalone entry signal. Use it to:
▸ Confirm directional bias across timeframes before entering trades
▸ Identify compression phases where breakouts are likely
▸ Gauge trend quality and exhaustion via the momentum score and bar duration
▸ Filter crossover signals — a Fast × Mid cross during an active squeeze with MTF confluence is a higher-probability setup than the same cross in isolation
Pairs well with oscillators (RSI, Stochastic), volume-based indicators, or support/resistance tools for entry timing.
This is not another moving average overlay. It is a full trend diagnostics dashboard designed to answer five questions at a glance: what is the trend, how strong is it, how long has it been running, is the ribbon compressing toward a breakout, and do higher timeframes agree.
🔹 CORE CONCEPT
Three exponential moving averages — fast (8), mid (21), and slow (55) — form a visual ribbon on the chart. When the EMAs stack in order (fast > mid > slow), the trend is bullish. When they invert, the trend is bearish. Anything else is a transitional state labeled neutral.
The ribbon is more than directional. The distance between the fastest and slowest EMA (the "spread") measures trend strength as a percentage, and the rate at which the ribbon expands or contracts reveals momentum shifts before price confirms them.
🔹 WHAT MAKES THIS DIFFERENT
Most EMA ribbons stop at direction and color. This indicator adds four analytical layers that standard ribbons lack:
▸ Ribbon Squeeze Detection
The indicator continuously measures ribbon width against its own moving average. When the three EMAs converge below a configurable threshold (default: 30% of average width), the ribbon turns yellow and the dashboard flags an active squeeze. Compression precedes expansion — a squeeze ending often marks the start of a directional move. Dedicated markers appear on the chart when a squeeze releases into a bullish or bearish trend.
▸ Composite Momentum Score (0–100)
A single number synthesizing four components, each weighted equally at 25 points:
— EMA alignment: full bullish or bearish stack scores 25, mixed scores 0
— Slope agreement: all three EMAs rising or all falling scores 25, partial agreement scores 12
— Spread strength: scaled between 0–25 based on where the current spread falls relative to the user-defined weak and strong thresholds
— Price position: price above the ribbon in a bullish trend (or below in bearish) scores 25, inside the ribbon scores 10, on the wrong side scores 0
The score is color-coded: cyan (80+), teal (60–79), orange (40–59), red (below 40).
▸ Dynamic Slope-Adaptive Colors
When enabled, each EMA line independently changes color based on its own slope — rising EMAs render green, falling EMAs render red. This provides an early visual warning when individual EMAs begin to flatten or turn, even while the overall stack remains intact. A bullish stack where the slow EMA has turned red is a qualitatively different signal than one where all three are green.
▸ Multi-Timeframe Dashboard
A built-in table displays trend state, spread, and grade across five timeframes simultaneously: the current chart timeframe plus 15-minute, 1-hour, 4-hour, and daily. The active chart timeframe is marked with ► in the MTF rows if it matches one of the fixed timeframes. A confluence row at the bottom counts how many timeframes are bullish versus bearish and outputs a directional bias: Strong Bull (4–5 aligned), Bull Lean (3), Neutral (mixed), Bear Lean (3 bearish), or Strong Bear (4–5 bearish).
🔹 CROSSOVER SIGNAL HIERARCHY
Not all EMA crossovers carry equal weight. The indicator differentiates three tiers with distinct marker sizes and shapes:
▸ Fast × Mid (tiny triangles) — Early signal. The 8 EMA crossing the 21 EMA indicates short-term momentum shift. Frequent, noisy, best used as an alert rather than a trigger.
▸ Fast × Slow (standard triangles) — Confirmation signal. The 8 EMA crossing the 55 EMA has more significance and filters out minor pullbacks.
▸ Mid × Slow (diamonds) — Trend shift signal. The 21 EMA crossing the 55 EMA typically marks a genuine change in trend direction. This is the least frequent and most reliable crossover in the set.
All crossover markers can be toggled off independently.
🔹 DASHBOARD COMPONENTS
The top-right dashboard (position and size adjustable) contains:
Row 1 — TREND: Current trend state (▲ Bullish / ▼ Bearish / ◆ Neutral) with bar count showing how long the trend has been active.
Row 2 — ZONE: Where price sits relative to the ribbon (Above / Inside / Below) alongside the momentum score out of 100.
Row 3 — SQUEEZE: Active squeeze status with a visual strength bar (██████░░░░) showing current spread intensity relative to its recent range.
Rows 4–9 — MTF OVERVIEW: Trend, spread, and grade for the current chart, 15m, 1H, 4H, and 1D timeframes.
Row 10 — BIAS: Multi-timeframe confluence verdict with bull/bear count.
🔹 SETTINGS
EMA Settings
▸ Fast / Mid / Slow EMA Period — Default 8/21/55. Periods must be in ascending order.
▸ Source — Close, Open, High, Low, HL2, HLC3, or OHLC4.
Overlay Settings
▸ Background Transparency — Controls the intensity of the trend-colored chart background (0–99).
▸ Crossover Signals — Toggle the three-tier crossover markers.
▸ Ribbon Fill — Toggle the colored fill between EMA lines. Fill turns yellow during active squeeze.
▸ Dynamic EMA Colors — Toggle slope-based EMA coloring (green = rising, red = falling).
▸ Bar Coloring — Optional candle coloring by trend state and price position. Off by default.
▸ Squeeze Detection — Toggle squeeze markers and dashboard squeeze status.
Dashboard
▸ Table Size — Tiny, Small, Normal, or Large.
▸ Table Position — 8 positions (corners, centers, sides).
Thresholds
▸ Weak/Strong spread thresholds (%) — Define what constitutes a weak, moderate, or strong trend spread. These should be adjusted per asset class (e.g., lower for forex, higher for crypto).
▸ Squeeze Lookback — Number of bars used to calculate the average ribbon width for squeeze detection.
▸ Squeeze Ratio — The compression threshold. A ribbon narrower than this ratio × average width triggers a squeeze flag.
🔹 ALERTS
Nine configurable alert conditions:
▸ Bullish / Bearish EMA Crossover (any tier)
▸ Mid × Slow Bullish / Bearish Shift
▸ Bullish / Bearish Stack Formed
▸ Squeeze Detected (compression begins)
▸ Squeeze Released (expansion starts)
▸ High Momentum (score crosses above 80)
🔹 SUGGESTED USE
This indicator works as a trend filter, not a standalone entry signal. Use it to:
▸ Confirm directional bias across timeframes before entering trades
▸ Identify compression phases where breakouts are likely
▸ Gauge trend quality and exhaustion via the momentum score and bar duration
▸ Filter crossover signals — a Fast × Mid cross during an active squeeze with MTF confluence is a higher-probability setup than the same cross in isolation
Pairs well with oscillators (RSI, Stochastic), volume-based indicators, or support/resistance tools for entry timing.
Open-source script
In true TradingView spirit, the creator of this script has made it open-source, so that traders can review and verify its functionality. Kudos to the author! While you can use it for free, remember that republishing the code is subject to our House Rules.
✅MY Free Signals Telegram
t.me/StrixEdge
✅Website
strix-edge.com
t.me/StrixEdge
✅Website
strix-edge.com
Disclaimer
The information and publications are not meant to be, and do not constitute, financial, investment, trading, or other types of advice or recommendations supplied or endorsed by TradingView. Read more in the Terms of Use.
Open-source script
In true TradingView spirit, the creator of this script has made it open-source, so that traders can review and verify its functionality. Kudos to the author! While you can use it for free, remember that republishing the code is subject to our House Rules.
✅MY Free Signals Telegram
t.me/StrixEdge
✅Website
strix-edge.com
t.me/StrixEdge
✅Website
strix-edge.com
Disclaimer
The information and publications are not meant to be, and do not constitute, financial, investment, trading, or other types of advice or recommendations supplied or endorsed by TradingView. Read more in the Terms of Use.