An uptrend is a run of higher highs and higher lows. A downtrend is a run of lower highs and lower lows. That is the whole definition, and almost every other tool is a compression of it. Edo Swing State stops the interpreting: it compares each new swing with the previous one of the same type, writes the label on the chart, and resolves the sequence into one state you can act on.
The four labels and what they say
When a swing high is confirmed it is compared with the previous confirmed high: above it, that is a Higher High (HH); below it, a Lower High (LH). When a swing low is confirmed it is compared with the previous low: above it, a Higher Low (HL); below it, a Lower Low (LL). A higher high says buyers pushed price through the previous ceiling; a higher low says the correction stopped above the previous floor. Together they are the signature of strength. Lower highs and lower lows are the mirror image. Labels are drawn above the swing for highs and below it for lows, teal on every high and red on every low, whatever its role, and once written they do not move.
Why the state needs both sides to agree
Above the individual labels the indicator resolves one overall state. Bullish requires a last high of HH and a last low of HL. Bearish requires a last high of LH and a last low of LL. Anything else is Ranging. Demanding that both sides agree is deliberate: if price makes a higher high and then loses the previous low, the structure is no longer cleanly bullish, and calling it bullish anyway would be the lie that costs money. Ranging is not a gap in the reading, it is the reading — the phase where the previous trend has lost one of its two supports.
The swing profile decides what counts as a swing
Sensitivity comes from a single input. Scalper needs 5 bars each side of a pivot, Swing needs 10 — the default, calibrated for the 4H and daily read — and Long Term needs 21, which leaves only the major turns on weekly and higher charts. The larger the length, the more significant a turn has to be before it is marked, so fewer swings appear and each one carries more weight. The right profile is the one whose marked swings match the turns you actually trade; on a fine intraday chart Long Term will look almost empty, and on a weekly chart Scalper will look like noise.
The panel: the state and the reason for it
The panel condenses everything into four rows under the indicator header. Structure gives the overall state. Last Swing gives the role of the most recent confirmed pivot. Last High and Last Low give the role of each side, coloured by role this time: teal for HH and HL, red for LH and LL. The state row is the underlying read; the last-high and last-low rows explain why the state is what it is, so the moment one of the two stops agreeing you can see the structure losing a leg instead of guessing at it. The panel sits in any of the four chart corners, comes in three sizes and two themes, and can be hidden entirely.
Reading it: filter, early warning, confluence
Three uses cover most of it. As a filter: look for longs while the state is Bullish and shorts while it is Bearish, and treat Ranging as a reason to wait. As an early warning: the first LH after a series of HHs, or the first HL after a series of LLs, is the earliest crack in a trend and is labelled the moment it is confirmed, long before the overall state turns. And as confluence: a Bullish state on the timeframe you trade, sitting inside a Bullish state on a higher one, is a far more solid trend than an isolated read — there is no internal multi-timeframe here, so the confluence is read by applying the indicator on more than one chart.
