Before you mark a single level, draw a single order block, or set a single alert, you need to know one thing: is today a bullish day or a bearish day? This is the ICT Daily Bias — and getting it wrong is the most expensive mistake a trader can make. Every ICT concept — kill zones, liquidity sweeps, fair value gaps, the Power of 3 — only works correctly when it is aligned with the right daily direction. Without a bias, you are trading setups in random directions and wondering why your win rate is inconsistent.
This guide explains exactly what the ICT Daily Bias is, the three signals used to determine it, how to read daily order flow, how to use previous day highs and lows as directional cues, how the daily open price factors in, and the complete pre-session workflow ICT traders run before the London kill zone opens. Multiple diagrams show what bullish and bearish bias looks like on a real chart — not as abstract theory but as visual patterns you can identify immediately.
Why Daily Bias Is the Foundation of the ICT Method
ICT methodology is built around institutional order flow — the idea that large banks and institutions move price in predictable patterns to collect liquidity and fill their orders. The daily timeframe is where those institutions frame their intentions for the day. They do not wake up and decide direction randomly — they operate within the context of where price has come from, where liquidity sits above and below, and which imbalances on the chart need to be filled.
When you establish a correct daily bias, you are aligning yourself with that institutional intention for the day. You are answering the same question the institutions already answered before the London session opened. Every kill zone setup, every liquidity sweep you watch for, every MSS entry trigger — all of it only makes sense when pointed in the direction of the day’s bias.
Without a bias, two things happen. First, you take setups in both directions and cancel out your own edge. Second, you end up entering the manipulation phase as if it were the distribution phase — buying into a fake rally that was manufactured to sweep liquidity before a bearish move. A correct daily bias would have told you to ignore that rally and wait for the short.
ICT’s teaching is explicit: establish the daily bias before the New York session opens — ideally before the London open. Once set, do not change your bias mid-session because price moved against you. If your bias was bullish and price sold off in the morning, that is the manipulation phase of a bullish day — not a sign to flip bearish. Changing bias mid-session based on intraday price action is how traders get whipsawed into entering on the wrong side of the real move.
The Three Signals That Determine Daily Bias
ICT daily bias is determined by reading three primary signals on the daily timeframe before the session begins. When two or three of these align in the same direction, the bias for the day is set. When they conflict, the day is marked as low-conviction and skipped.
These three signals work together as a filter system. The more signals pointing in the same direction, the higher the conviction in the bias. A day where all three are aligned is a high-probability trading day. A day where order flow says bearish but there is a major bullish FVG below and buy-side liquidity above is an ambiguous day — reduce size or sit out entirely.
Signal 1 — Daily Order Flow
Order flow is the direction of the trend as expressed by the sequence of swing highs and swing lows on the daily chart. You learned this in the Market Structure Shift article — a higher high and higher low sequence is bullish order flow, and a lower high and lower low sequence is bearish order flow.
Reading order flow for daily bias is straightforward: open your chart on D1 and look at the last three to five daily candles. Are the swing lows stepping higher? Bullish order flow — bias is long. Are the swing highs stepping lower? Bearish order flow — bias is short.
Left: bullish D1 order flow — HH and HL sequence. Bias is long. Only look for buy setups during kill zones. Right: bearish D1 order flow — LH and LL sequence. Bias is short. Only look for sell setups.
One important nuance: the daily chart order flow tells you the dominant direction, not necessarily today’s specific move. Within a bullish order flow day, price may dip in the morning (the manipulation phase) before rallying into the New York session (distribution). Your bullish bias correctly keeps you out of the short and positioned for the long entry after the morning dip.
Signal 2 — The Draw on Liquidity
The draw on liquidity is where price is being pulled toward — the next significant pool of unfilled orders that the market is likely to reach before the day ends. ICT calls this the “DOL” and it is one of the most important concepts in setting daily bias correctly.
Liquidity pools sit at predictable locations: previous day’s high, previous day’s low, previous week’s high and low, equal highs and equal lows, round numbers. Price is always moving from one liquidity pool to another. If the nearest significant liquidity above current price is a clear previous week’s high with equal highs at that level, and the nearest liquidity below is a minor swing low with no major concentration, price is more likely to move upward toward the larger liquidity pool. Bias is bullish.
Left: major liquidity (buy stops) sits above current price with only a minor SSL below — price is likely drawn upward. Bullish bias. Right: major liquidity (sell stops) sits below with only a minor BSL above — price is likely drawn downward. Bearish bias.
Where to Look for the Draw on Liquidity
- Previous Day’s High (PDH) and Previous Day’s Low (PDL) — the most commonly targeted intraday liquidity levels. Mark both at the start of every session.
- Previous Week’s High (PWH) and Previous Week’s Low (PWL) — larger pools, targeted on multi-day moves.
- Equal Highs and Equal Lows — double or triple tops/bottoms. Dense stop clusters that price is magnetically attracted to.
- Round numbers — 1.1000 on EUR/USD, 150.00 on USD/JPY, 2000 on Gold. Retail order concentration.
- Swing highs and lows on the H4 or D1 chart — unswept swing points from previous sessions.
Signal 3 — Daily Fair Value Gaps (Imbalances)
The third signal is the presence of unfilled Fair Value Gaps on the daily chart. A daily FVG is a three-candle imbalance on the D1 chart — price moved so strongly in one direction that it left a gap between candle one’s wick and candle three’s wick. Price has a strong tendency to return and fill these gaps before continuing.
If there is an unfilled bullish FVG below current price — a zone where price previously moved up rapidly and left an imbalance — price is likely to pull back down into it before continuing higher. This confirms a bullish day with a morning dip (the manipulation sweep into the FVG) before the afternoon rally. Bias is bullish.
If there is an unfilled bearish FVG above current price — where price previously sold off and left an imbalance above — price is likely to rally up into it before dropping. Bias is bearish with a morning rally manipulation before the real selloff.
Left: unfilled bullish FVG below current price — expect a dip into it (the manipulation) before the bullish rally continues. Bias is long. Right: unfilled bearish FVG above current price — expect a morning rally into it before the real selloff. Bias is short.
The Previous Day’s Candle — Reading the Story
The previous day’s candle gives you more information than most traders extract from it. ICT teaches a specific way of reading the prior daily candle for directional clues.
The Previous Day’s High and Low
Mark both the PDH (Previous Day’s High) and PDL (Previous Day’s Low) at the start of every session. These are the two most commonly targeted intraday liquidity levels. If the daily bias is bullish, price will typically dip toward the PDL in the morning (the manipulation sweep) before rallying through the PDH during the New York session. If bearish, it will rally toward the PDH in the morning before dropping through the PDL.
Classic bullish bias day: Asian session accumulation → London Kill Zone manipulation sweep to PDL → MSS on M15 → New York session distribution breaks through PDH. The bullish bias identified before the session kept you out of the morning short and positioned for the long.
The Daily Open Price
The price at which the daily candle opens is another tool for bias confirmation. In ICT methodology, the daily open acts as a reference midpoint for the day. When price trades above the daily open for the majority of the session, the day is bullish. When price trades below the daily open, the day is bearish.
More specifically: if today’s open is in the lower half of the prior daily range (below the previous candle’s 50% midpoint), price is in a discount zone — favorable for buying. Bias is bullish. If today’s open is in the upper half of the prior daily range (above the previous candle’s midpoint), price is in a premium zone — favorable for selling. Bias is bearish.
The Complete Pre-Session Bias Workflow
Here is the exact process to run before every trading session — ideally completed before the London Kill Zone opens (7 AM Ghana time / 2 AM New York time).
- Open D1 chart — read weekly and daily order flow Check the weekly chart first: are the weekly candles making higher highs and higher lows, or lower lows and lower highs? This is your highest timeframe bias. Then read the last 5 daily candles for the same structure. Note: bullish, bearish, or mixed.
- Identify the draw on liquidity Mark the PDH and PDL. Mark any clear equal highs, equal lows, or major swing points within 1–3 days of current price. Ask: which pool of orders is larger and more significant — the one above or below current price? That is where price is likely drawn today.
- Check for daily FVGs Are there any unfilled D1 Fair Value Gaps above or below current price? If a bullish FVG sits below and order flow is bullish, expect a morning dip into it before the rally. Mark the FVG zone.
- Read the prior daily candle How did it close? Was it bullish or bearish? Did it close near the high or low of its range? Did it sweep any significant liquidity before closing? This tells you what the institutions accomplished yesterday and what they may be doing today.
- Mark the New York Midnight Open Note the price at midnight New York time (5 AM Ghana time). Is current price above or below it? Above = bullish lean. Below = bearish lean.
- Set your bias — bullish, bearish, or no trade Based on the majority of the signals, set your bias for the day. Write it down: “Bullish — DOL is PDH, order flow bullish, FVG below at 1.2680.” If signals conflict with no clear majority, mark it as a no-trade day and sit out.
- Wait for the kill zone Do not take any trades before the London Kill Zone (7 AM Ghana time). Use the pre-session time to mark your levels, not to enter trades. The manipulation and MSS that you will use as your entry trigger happen within the kill zone — not before it.
Bullish vs Bearish Bias — What Each Day Looks Like
Left: bullish bias day — Asian range, London dips to sweep SSL (PDL), MSS up, New York rallies through PDH. Right: bearish bias day — Asian range, London rallies to sweep BSL (PDH), MSS down, New York drops through PDL. The shape is the AMD sequence made visible.
Common Mistakes in Setting Daily Bias
Changing bias mid-session
The most destructive habit in ICT trading. You set a bullish bias before the session, then the London session sells off strongly and you flip to bearish. You have just been fooled by the manipulation phase of a bullish day. The London selloff is the setup for the New York long — it swept the PDL, collected sell-side liquidity, and set up the bullish MSS. If you flip to bearish at that moment, you short directly into the real move up. Set your bias once, before the session, and hold it unless the daily structure fundamentally changes on the D1 chart.
Setting bias without checking the weekly timeframe
A bullish D1 day inside a bearish weekly trend is a counter-trend long. These work sometimes but carry lower probability and often reverse after a smaller than expected move. Always check whether your daily bias aligns with the weekly order flow. The strongest setups are daily long trades inside weekly uptrends, or daily short trades inside weekly downtrends.
Trading on days with no clear bias
Some days the signals genuinely conflict — bullish order flow but bearish FVG and unclear DOL. On those days, the correct action is no action. Not every day has a tradeable setup. Forcing a bias on an ambiguous day leads to random direction trades that erode your statistics. ICT traders aim to identify two or three genuinely high-conviction bias days per week and trade those exclusively rather than trading every day.
Confusing the daily bias with the weekly trend
The daily bias is for today’s session only. It does not necessarily align with the weekly trend — a bearish weekly trend can have bullish bias days within it (the daily retracements upward within the larger weekly downtrend). The weekly trend tells you the higher-timeframe direction. The daily bias tells you which way today’s specific session is likely to move within that context.
Frequently Asked Questions
For the concepts that directly apply the daily bias, see: ICT Power of 3 — Accumulation, Manipulation, Distribution, Market Structure Shift (MSS), Liquidity Sweeps, and ICT Kill Zones. For Ghana-specific session times, use the Kill Zone Time Converter to know exactly when to be watching the charts each morning.