Bookmap Review 2023: Is this the best day trading software?

Bookmap History

Bookmap emerged from a collaboration of seasoned traders and software developers. Recognizing the need for a more insightful trading platform, this team envisioned a tool that could enhance both trader decisions and trade executions. Their strategy hinged on harnessing real-time market data visualization. After dedicated years of crafting and refining, Bookmap debuted in 2014, rapidly gaining favor among global day traders.

The platform’s unique selling point is its commitment to precision in real-time data visualization. At its core, Bookmap is designed to depict a deeper, highly accurate view of the market through an innovative heatmap feature. Tsachi Galanos, the CEO, breaks down the platform’s name into its essential components: OrderBOOK and HeatMAP, reflecting its core functionalities.

Bookmap stands out by offering a comprehensive view. It doesn’t curate or condense; instead, it illuminates the full market depth, ensuring traders have a clear and complete analysis.

Pricing

Bookmap offers four different subscription levels to suit the needs and budgets of different traders. The plans available include:

Digital: The most basic plan, offered for free. It includes access to delayed market data, volume dots, and price levels.

Digital Plus: For $19/mo, this plan includes everything in the Digital plan, plus access to additional market data providers and the ability to customize the interface.

Global: For $49/mo, this plan includes everything in the Digital Plus plan, as well as access to market replay and additional market data sources.

Global Plus: For $99/mo, this is the most comprehensive plan offered by Bookmap. It includes everything in the Global plan, plus access to advanced market data analysis tools and personalized training sessions.

With so many plans, there should be a plan in everyone’s price range. It should be noted users can save 20% on subscription costs by paying yearly.

Key Features of Bookmap

In this section, we’ll break down the key features that set Bookmap apart from other trading platforms on the market.

Heatmap Visualization

The cornerstone of Bookmap’s platform is its heatmap visualization, which displays a color-coded representation of the order book for various financial instruments (stocks, futures, options, etc.). The heatmap continuously updates in real-time, allowing traders to follow shifts in the interaction between buyers and sellers and quickly identify key support and resistance levels.

According to user reviews, this heatmap visualization stands out in the market and enhances trading strategy:

“Bookmap is a wonderful order flow tool that has me helped me tighten my risk and stay in trades longer due to being able to see the interaction of the buyers and sellers like no other product on the market.”

Order Flow

Bookmap offers an unparalleled glimpse into order flow, refreshing its data a remarkable 40 times every second. This ensures traders receive near-instantaneous insights into current market activities. Complementing this rapid update is Bookmap’s stellar visualization arsenal, including intuitive heatmaps and Volume Bubbles. This combination facilitates quick information assimilation, enabling prompt action.

Current Order Book

Bookmap’s Current Order Book (COB) provides a visual portrayal of pending orders in real-time. This graphical interface allows traders to understand support and resistance levels for their chosen asset, revealing liquidity at different price tiers. Such a display can be invaluable in pinpointing market opportunities.

Located to the graph’s right, this order book employs a colormap to illustrate historical orders. While red and green are the default color choices, customization allows for a range of hues to cater to individual preferences.

Whether you’re examining in terms of numbers or percentages, or exploring the aggregate or extended display options, Bookmap ensures clarity and efficiency in presenting the current order landscape.

Volume Dots and Trade Alerts

Bookmap’s volume dots provide visual cues on the size and direction of executed trades. These dots, combined with customizable trade alerts, help traders quickly identify shifts in market momentum and make better-informed decisions based on trading volume.

Historical and Real-time Data

Bookmap provides both historical and real-time market data, offering valuable insights to both short-term and long-term traders. Users can access an extensive range of data sources, including Rithmic, DXFeed, and IQFeed, for comprehensive market analysis.

Analytical Indicators

Bookmap stands out with its tailored analytical indicators designed for interpreting market liquidity. Unlike traditional metrics like RSI or Bollinger Bands, Bookmap focuses on real-time order book insights.

The Imbalance Tracker offers a snapshot of current order book disparities, serving as an accurate gauge of market sentiment. Paired with Bookmap’s fast data retrieval, traders can quickly identify and act upon market anomalies.

For day traders, the Strength Level Indicator illuminates liquidity depth by showcasing transaction volumes within set periods. Meanwhile, the Large Lot Tracker reveals the big players in the market by highlighting those with the most substantial contract volumes.

The Stops & Icebergs Tracker offers insights into major market participants’ strategies, pinpointing fragmented orders. It not only signals emerging opportunities but also acts as a shield against market manipulations like spoofing.

Customizable and Powerful Add-ons

Bookmap’s platform is incredibly customizable, allowing users to create their own custom indicators and add-ons or choose from a multitude of third-party solutions. This flexibility ensures that traders can tailor their Bookmap trading sessions to suit their individual needs and strategies.

Education

Bookmap places a strong emphasis on education, presenting a bevy of learning tools for traders. From detailed text and video tutorials to comprehensive webinars, there’s an abundance of resources to explore.

Professional traders lead many of the webinars, available in various languages. Beyond that, their blog provides insightful interviews and articles for a deeper understanding. For hands-on learning, Bookmap offers video courses coupled with practical exercises.

If real-time interaction is what you’re after, they host live trading discussions, which encompass order flow analysis and interactive Q&A sessions. While many materials are available for free or to those with basic accounts, some specialized content necessitates a premium subscription.

For collaborative learning and networking, Bookmap’s Discord community offers a vibrant space for traders to connect and share insights.

Bookmap Additional Features

• One-click trading: Bookmap’s one-click trading feature makes it easy for traders to execute trades quickly and efficiently.
• Range of market data providers: Bookmap offers data from multiple market data providers, giving traders a more comprehensive view of the market.
• Depth of market: Bookmap’s depth of market feature allows traders to see the full limit order book, giving them a better understanding of market liquidity and helping them spot trading opportunities.
• Customizable interface: Bookmap’s interface can be customized to suit the needs and preferences of individual traders. This includes the ability to choose between different color schemes, add or remove certain data points, and more.

Broker Compatibility

Bookmap provides compatibility with a select range of brokers for trading assets like stocks and futures. Among the notable brokers supported are Interactive Brokers, TradeStation, dxFeed, and Rithmic. Those using platforms such as TD Ameritrade’s Thinkorswim can also incorporate Bookmap for enhanced functionality.

Bookmap supports the crypto market, offering integration with leading crypto exchanges like Coinbase, Binance, and Kraken. The fact that they support Cryptocurrency trading shows that Bookmap is a cutting-edge trading platform.

For those looking to trade live, linking the software to an API or a brokerage account is essential.

This is crucial for executing orders across stocks, ETFs, futures, and cryptocurrencies. To access trading capabilities for certain assets, a paid subscription becomes necessary.

It’s worth noting that while Bookmap’s broker compatibility list isn’t exhaustive, it does support approximately 30 data feeds and brokerage firms.

Who is Bookmap Best for?

Bookmap is a unique trading platform that caters to a particular subset of traders. It might not be the best fit for everyone, but it could be a game-changer for the right user. Let’s explore who might benefit most from what Bookmap has to offer.

• Day Traders: The real-time data, volume dots, and heatmap visualization of the order book offered by Bookmap are powerful tools for day traders. These features allow them to see market trends and liquidity in real-time and quickly spot potential trading opportunities. The platform’s one-click trading feature also allows day traders to execute trades quickly, which is crucial in the fast-paced world of day trading.
• Scalpers: Scalpers, who aim to profit from small price changes, can greatly benefit from Bookmap’s real-time data and visualization features. The ability to view the depth of market data can help scalpers understand the market liquidity and make quick decisions.
• Algorithmic Traders: Those who use automated trading systems or algorithms could benefit from Bookmap’s customizable features. The platform allows users to create their own custom indicators and add-ons, which can be used to refine and enhance their algorithmic trading strategies.
• Traders Seeking Depth of Market (DOM) Information: Bookmap’s depth of market feature provides a detailed view of market liquidity at different price levels. This information can be incredibly valuable for traders looking to understand the supply and demand dynamics of a particular security.
• Experienced Traders: While Bookmap can be a bit overwhelming for beginners due to its complexity, experienced traders who are familiar with different trading tools and strategies can take full advantage of the platform’s unique features. The platform provides a wealth of information and a high degree of customization, allowing experienced traders to tailor their trading experience to their specific needs and strategies.

Pros

There are many reasons why traders might choose Bookmap as their go-to platform. Some of the most compelling advantages of Bookmap include:

• Real-time market data: Bookmap provides up-to-the-second market data, so traders can stay on top of the latest price movements and trading activity from major exchanges. This is especially useful for day traders, who need to make quick decisions based on constantly changing market conditions.
• Comprehensive market data visualization: Bookmap’s unique volume dots and price levels display allows traders to see the full picture of market liquidity and trends. This can help traders identify hidden price patterns and make more informed trading decisions.
• One-click trading: Bookmap’s one-click trading feature makes it easy for traders to execute trades quickly and efficiently. This can be especially useful in fast-moving markets where every second counts.
• Range of market data providers: Bookmap offers data from multiple market data providers, giving traders a more comprehensive view of the market. This can help traders make better-informed trading decisions and spot trading opportunities that might otherwise be missed.

Cons

Of course, no trading platform is perfect, and Bookmap is no exception. Some potential drawbacks to consider include:

• Cost: Bookmap is not the cheapest trading platform on the market. While it does offer a basic Digital plan for free, more advanced plans such as Digital Plus (for $16/mo), Global (for $39/mo), and Global Plus (for $79/mo) can be quite expensive for some traders.
• Complexity: Some traders may find the volume dots and other visualization tools offered by Bookmap to be a bit overwhelming, especially for those new to trading. It may take some time to fully understand and utilize all of the features offered by the platform.
• Limited platform compatibility: Currently, Bookmap is only available as a desktop application, and is not compatible with mobile devices or web browsers. This can be inconvenient for traders who prefer to trade on-the-go or from multiple devices.

Bookmap Review – Final Thoughts

So, is Bookmap worth the investment? Ultimately, this will depend on your individual needs and trading goals. If you’re a day trader looking for a comprehensive platform that offers real-time market data, volume dots and price levels, and one-click trading, then Bookmap might be worth considering.

If you’re still unsure after reading this Bookmap review, consider trying out the free Digital plan to get a feel for the platform before committing to a paid subscription. And remember, no trading platform can guarantee success in the stock market, so it’s important to do your own research and make informed decisions based on your own risk tolerance and financial goals.

If you’re ready to give Bookmap a try,

Sign up for the basic Digital plan for free or upgrade to one of the paid plans to unlock additional features and market data providers. Whatever plan you choose, Bookmap can be a valuable tool in your trading arsenal, helping you to make more informed decisions and spot trading opportunities in real-time.

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