Shooting Star and Inverted Hammer
— How to Read a Candle With a Long Upper Wick
A candle with a long upper wick and a body pushed toward the bottom also has two names. The shooting star and the inverted hammer are the same shape. The same record — pushed up intraday, then gave it back — gets read differently depending on where it shows up.
What a Long Upper Wick Means
The upper wick is the distance between the high and the top of the body. A long distance here means that at some point intraday the price reached that level, but couldn't hold it by the close.
The record itself is simple: sellers won up top. But what that fact actually means depends on where that candle is sitting. This is exactly why Candlestick Chart Basics describes a wick as "a mark of rejection."
Shooting Star — When It Shows Up at the Top of a Rally
When this shape appears at the top of an ongoing uptrend, it's called a Shooting Star. Since it's a record of the price reaching near a new high intraday and then getting pushed back, it marks the first spot where clear selling showed up at that price level.
- The upper wick is at least 2x the body
- The lower wick is minimal
- The body sits toward the bottom of the candle's overall range
- There was a preceding uptrend
The longer the upper wick, the bigger the pullback it represents, which makes the record clearer. That said, length alone can't tell you the strength of the signal — you also need to check whether trading actually picked up that day, which gives you a basis for judging whether that selling was just a temporary flush.
Inverted Hammer — When It Shows Up at the Bottom of a Decline
The same shape at the bottom of a downtrend is an Inverted Hammer. The reading is different in flavor here, because it's a record that, in a stretch that had kept getting pushed down, a push upward showed up for the first time. The attempt ultimately gave the gain back, but the attempt itself is a move that hadn't been there before.
An inverted hammer demands more confirmation than a hammer. A hammer with a long lower wick closes the day with the recovery intact, but an inverted hammer closes the day having gone up and then been pushed back down, so whether that attempt continues is still an open question.
The Only Thing That Splits the Two Is the Prior Trend
| Shooting Star | Inverted Hammer | |
|---|---|---|
| Shape | Identical — long upper wick, small body, short lower wick | |
| Preceding trend | Uptrend | Downtrend |
| What the record shows | Selling showed up at the top | An attempt to push higher showed up |
| Confirmation from the next candle | Whether the low gets broken | Whether the high gets broken |
← Scroll sideways to see the full table.
When It's Confused With a Gravestone Doji
Among candles with only a long upper wick, one whose body has essentially disappeared is classified as a gravestone doji. A shooting star still has a body, even a small one. The line between the two is genuinely blurry in practice quite often, so it's more useful to remember that the shared fact — "it gave the gain back at the top" — matters more than the exact classification.
When It Shows Up After a Gap Up
The combination of opening well above the prior close and then closing with a long upper wick stands out in particular, because it overlaps with the price filling back into the gap it opened. This connects to the scenarios covered in Gap Up and Spike and Fade.