Tradovate Bid-Ask Imbalance Numbers Stop Showing
The candles keep printing but the bid/ask figures inside them go blank, usually right as the tape speeds up. Here's the zoom trap versus the real Legacy-chart bug, and how to fix each one.
You're reading order flow on the Bid-Ask Imbalance chart, watching the bid and ask volume printed inside each candle, and then the numbers just stop. The candles keep forming. The bars still stack. But the figures that make the view worth using have gone blank, usually right as the tape speeds up and you need them most. Flip to another tab and back and they might reappear for a while. Ten minutes later they're gone again. If that's the loop you're stuck in, you're not fighting a setting you forgot to flip, you've hit a real rendering defect in Tradovate's older chart, and there's both a quick patch to get through the session and a permanent fix worth doing once.
Fastest fix: click to another tab (or another chart) and back to force the Bid-Ask numbers to redraw. Scrolling the mouse wheel on the chart does the same. It works often, not always. The lasting fix is to stop using the Legacy chart for this view, the number-rendering bug is resolved on the newer Chart module.
Quick Checklist for Missing Bid-Ask Imbalance Numbers
- You're on the Legacy chart, the blank-numbers defect lives here. Rebuild the Bid-Ask view on the newer Chart module to end it for good.
- Switch tabs or scroll the wheel, a temporary redraw that buys you time mid-session when you can't stop to reconfigure.
- You're zoomed too far out, the digits can't fit the candle width, so they hide. Zoom in until they reappear.
- Numbers won't fit at your scale, turn on Bar Histograms to keep a visual read even when the figures are too small to print.
- It's worse in fast markets, high volume and volatility make the Legacy defect surface more. It's not your imagination and it's not your data feed.
- Same on Chrome, Edge and the desktop app, reinstalling or switching browser won't touch a bug that lives inside the Legacy chart.
What “Bid-Ask Imbalance Numbers Stopped Showing” Actually Means
Tradovate's Bid-Ask chart is its built-in footprint view. Instead of a single candle body, each bar breaks trading down by price level and shows how much volume traded on the bid versus the ask. You switch it on by setting the chart type to Bid-Ask Volume, and from there you can flip between a few readings of the same data: raw Bid-Ask Volume, Delta, and Imbalance. The Imbalance view is the one that highlights lopsided bid/ask prints based on your own thresholds, and it leans heavily on those numeric labels being legible. When the numbers blank out, the view loses its whole point.
There's no error dialog for this. Tradovate doesn't pop a warning; the figures simply stop drawing while the candles carry on. That silence is why it gets misdiagnosed. It helps to know there are two completely different reasons the numbers can go missing, and the fix depends entirely on which one you're looking at.
The Two Reasons the Numbers Vanish
1. Your zoom level is hiding them (expected behavior)
This one isn't a bug. The bid/ask figures need a minimum amount of pixel space to render, and if you're zoomed out far enough, there's simply no room to fit them inside a candle at a readable font size, so Tradovate hides them rather than printing a smear you couldn't read anyway. Zoom in with the scroll wheel until the price levels spread apart, and the numbers come back. The trade-off is obvious: to keep the figures visible you can end up so zoomed in that you only see a short slice of the session on screen at once. If that's your situation, the numbers were never really “broken”, they just didn't fit.
2. The Legacy chart's rendering defect (the actual bug)
This is the one people mean when they say the numbers “stop showing.” On the older Legacy chart, the numeric data blanks out at random during a session even when you're zoomed in plenty to read it. It sticks around too, not a one-second flicker but minutes of unusable chart, and for some traders it runs for days at a stretch. It tends to bite hardest during high-volume, high-volatility stretches when candles are printing fast. Crucially, it's been reproduced the same way across Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and the Tradovate desktop app for Windows, all on the Legacy chart. That cross-platform consistency is the tell: if a bug follows you across two browsers and a native app, it isn't your machine, your cache, or your connection. It's the chart.
How to Fix Disappearing Bid-Ask Numbers: Step-by-Step
Get the numbers back right now (temporary)
Switch tabs and back
Click to another workspace tab or another chart tab, then click straight back to the Bid-Ask chart. The redraw usually forces the figures to repaint.
Scroll the wheel
If tab-switching doesn't do it, hover the chart and scroll the mouse wheel a notch. That refit also nudges the numbers to load.
Expect to repeat this
On the Legacy chart the fix rarely holds, you may have to scroll almost constantly to keep the labels on screen, which is exactly why it's a stopgap and not a solution.
Make the numbers fit at your zoom (Bar Histograms)
Open the Bid-Ask view settings
If your problem is really the zoom trap, open the chart's settings for the Bid-Ask view.
Enable Bar Histograms
Enable the Bar Histograms option (sometimes shown as “Show Bar Histograms”) and pick your colors. This draws a small volume histogram inside each candle so you can still read the imbalance visually when the numeric figures won't fit.
Choose a sizing mode
PerBar scales each candle's histogram against the largest volume within that same candle; PerSeries scales every bar against the largest volume across the whole loaded chart. PerSeries is better for comparing candles to each other; PerBar is better for reading the shape inside one candle.
Confirm current labels
The exact wording of these options can shift between platform versions, so confirm the current labels in your own settings panel. The behavior is what matters: a visual fallback that survives being zoomed out.
Histograms won't cure the Legacy defect, if the bug blanks a candle, it can blank the histogram too, but they make the zoom-related case far less painful.
Fix it permanently (move off the Legacy chart)
Open a new Chart module
Open a new Chart module, the newer, non-Legacy chart, and load the same symbol and account.
Set Bid-Ask Volume and Imbalance
Set its chart type to Bid-Ask Volume and select the Imbalance reading, matching the thresholds you used on the Legacy view.
Watch it through a busy stretch
The numeric-display problem is resolved on the newer Chart module, so the figures should stay put where the Legacy chart would have dropped them.
Retire the Legacy chart
Make the newer chart your default and retire the Legacy Bid-Ask chart from your workspace so you're not tempted back into the bug.
One honest caveat: the newer Chart module doesn't carry over every Legacy display option one-for-one. If you specifically relied on a fully transparent bar color on the Legacy chart, you may not find an exact match on the newer one, that's the main reason some traders cling to Legacy despite the flicker. Check your color and style options after switching; for most people, reliable numbers beat a niche color setting.
Troubleshooting Table
| What you see | What's going on | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Numbers gone when zoomed out, back when zoomed in | Digits can't fit the candle width (expected) | Zoom in, or enable Bar Histograms for a visual fallback |
| Numbers blank at a readable zoom, mid-session | Legacy chart rendering defect | Switch tabs / scroll to patch; rebuild the view on the newer Chart module |
| Only a constant scroll keeps them visible | Classic Legacy-chart symptom | Move off Legacy, the newer chart holds the numbers |
| Worse during fast, high-volume markets | Defect surfaces under load | Don't rely on Legacy for live order-flow reads |
| Same on Chrome, Edge and desktop app | Bug is in the Legacy chart, not your setup | Reinstalling won't help; change the chart module |
| Numbers fine, but colors look different after switching | Newer chart lacks a Legacy-only style option | Reconfigure colors on the new chart; accept reliable numbers |
Don't Let a Flickering Chart Cost You the Trade
The reason a blank Bid-Ask chart stings is that you're using it to time entries by hand, read the imbalance, click the order. When the numbers drop out for a minute in a fast tape, that's the exact minute you miss. If your edge is a repeatable order-flow condition, the sturdier move is to turn that read into a rule and let it execute on its own, so a rendering bug on one chart module never sits between you and the fill. That's where PickMyTrade comes in, it links your TradingView alerts straight to Tradovate and manages the orders for you:
- TradingView-native execution, your alert fires from the TradingView chart you already trust, independent of whether Tradovate's Legacy chart is drawing numbers or not.
- Server-side bracket management, your stop and target live on PickMyTrade's engine, so your risk is defined even when a chart panel is misbehaving.
- Automatic trade logging, every entry and exit is recorded off-platform, giving you a clean record no chart glitch can erase.
- Multi-account sync, the same managed orders mirror across every connected account, so you're never reconciling by eye across flickering charts.
Automate Your Order-Flow Read
Turn a repeatable Bid-Ask imbalance condition into automated Tradovate execution, no chart module has to stay glitch-free for your entries to fire.
Start Your Free 5-Day TrialFrequently Asked Questions
Two things cause it. Either you're zoomed too far out and the bid/ask figures can't fit inside the candle width, or you're on the older Legacy chart, which has a rendering defect that blanks the numbers mid-session. Zoom in to rule out the first; if the numbers still drop at a readable scale, it's the Legacy-chart bug.
Click to another tab and back, or scroll the mouse wheel on the chart to force a redraw. Both usually pop the numbers back, though not every time, and on the Legacy chart you often have to repeat the scroll almost constantly to keep them visible.
If the numbers vanish while you're zoomed in enough to read them, it's a genuine defect in Tradovate's Legacy chart, not a setting you missed. It's been reproduced across Chrome, Edge, and the Windows desktop app, so switching browsers won't help.
The Legacy-chart defect shows up most during high volume and volatility, exactly when new candles print fastest. It's frustrating because that's when order-flow reads matter most, but it points straight at the rendering bug rather than your data feed.
It's a chart setting that draws a small volume histogram inside each candle so you keep a visual read even when the numeric figures are too small to fit. It has PerBar and PerSeries sizing modes. Turn it on if you frequently trade zoomed out, it won't cure the Legacy defect, but it keeps the imbalance readable.
The newer Chart module fixes the number-rendering problem, but a few Legacy display options may not carry over one-for-one, such as a fully transparent bar color. Labels and available options change between versions, so check your current settings, but for most traders, the reliable numbers are worth the switch.
Both. The blank-numbers issue on the Legacy chart has been seen in Chrome, in Edge, and in the Tradovate desktop app for Windows. Reinstalling the app or clearing your browser won't fix a defect that lives in the Legacy chart itself.
This guide is for educational and informational purposes only and is not financial, investment, or trading advice. Trading futures and other leveraged products carries a substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for every investor. PickMyTrade is an independent third-party automation platform and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Tradovate, Inc. or Bookmap. All related names, logos, and trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Platform features and steps change over time, so always confirm the current process in the official platform documentation before acting.