Block Arrow

The Block Arrow draws a filled arrow as a single closed outline — a shaft with a triangular head, not a line with a decoration on the end. That distinction is the whole reason the tool exists alongside the Arrow Marker annotation. A one-pixel stroke with a small head is perfectly legible on the screen it was drawn on, and effectively disappears when the chart is scaled into a slide, printed, or opened on a phone. A filled shape keeps its meaning at any size.

Three clicks place it: the tail, the tip, and then a point whose perpendicular distance from the tail-to-tip axis sets the shaft half-width. Taking the width from a click rather than a slider means the arrow is sized against the price action it points at, in one gesture, rather than against an abstract number that has to be tuned afterwards.

The head is proportioned from the shaft width rather than from the arrow's length. A long arrow therefore keeps a sensible head instead of growing into a spear, and a short one does not become all head. Where the length cannot accommodate a full head at the requested width, the arrow becomes a plain triangle — the honest result, rather than letting the shaft and head overlap into a self-intersecting outline.

1. 1
   Select the Block Arrow tool

   Choose Block Arrow from the Shapes group in the drawing toolbar.
2. 2
   Click the tail

   Place the first point where the arrow should start — typically on the cause, the level, or the bar being pointed away from.
3. 3
   Click the tip

   Place the second point where the arrow should point. Until the third click the arrow previews at a default width so you can judge the direction.
4. 4
   Click to set the width

   Move away from the axis and click. The perpendicular distance becomes the shaft half-width; the head resizes with it.
5. 5
   Adjust

   Drag any of the three handles to change the tail, the tip or the width. Open the popup for colour, fill and line style.

• Direction on a shared chart — a solid arrow survives being scaled into a deck, printed, or viewed on a phone. A one-pixel line with a small head does not, which is the practical reason a desk chart uses block arrows for anything leaving the building.
• Flow between levels — point from a breakout level to a measured target. The arrow's width can carry meaning too: a wide arrow for the primary expectation, a narrow one for the alternative.
• Cause and effect — connect a news bar to the move it produced, or a divergence to the reversal that followed. The tail sits on the cause, the tip on the effect.
• Order flow annotation — mark where size entered and which way it pushed price, at a weight proportional to the size involved.
• Teaching material — arrows are the clearest way to direct a reader's eye through a sequence, and a filled arrow reproduces reliably at any size.

• 1.The Visual Display of Quantitative Information — Edward R. Tufte
• 2.Chart annotation best practices — TradingView Help