On-balance volume (OBV)
On-balance volume is a running total that adds the day's full volume when the stock closes up and subtracts it when the stock closes down, tracking cumulative buying and selling pressure over time.
`obv` keeps a running total of volume signed by each day's direction: the whole day's volume is added if the close was higher than the previous close, subtracted if lower. The absolute number is meaningless — it depends on where the series started — but its shape is the point. Rising OBV means up days are carrying the volume; falling OBV means down days are.
The classic reading is that volume leads price. When OBV makes a new high before price does, buying pressure is already at breakout levels — the OBV at a six-month high scan (`obv() is highest in 26w`) looks for exactly that lead. The streak form is also useful: OBV rising for five bars means every recent session resolved in the buyers' favour by volume, whatever the closes looked like. Divergence — price at new highs while OBV is not — is the bearish mirror.
OBV's crudeness is its known weakness: a day that closes up ₹0.05 on huge volume books all of that volume as buying, and one large block trade can bend the line for weeks. It is best read as a trend, over weeks, and confirmed against something computed differently. On NSE data the delivery percentage is the natural cross-check — OBV infers conviction from intraday direction, delivery reports overnight conviction directly.
Against its siblings: OBV signs the entire day's volume by close-to-close direction, all or nothing. Accumulation/distribution weights each day's volume by where the close sat inside the day's range, so a weak close counts against the stock even on an up day. Chaikin money flow is A/D normalised over a 20-bar window, which turns the unbounded line into an oscillator around zero.
In Sift
Written as obv — a signed running total; only its direction and relative levels matter. A working scan — Cumulative volume flow at a six-month high while the trend holds:
where obv() is highest in 26w and close > sma(50)1
of the 500 most-traded NSE stocks match today, as of 20 Aug 2026
Scans that use it
Prebuilt scans in the library whose query reads this value — each with a hit-rate replay over the last 250 sessions.
Common questions
What does rising OBV mean?
That recent up days have carried more volume than recent down days — the sessions are resolving in the buyers' favour. The classic interpretation is that this pressure precedes price: OBV making new highs while price has not yet is read as accumulation leading a move. It is a tendency worth checking, not a rule.
What is a good OBV value?
There is none. OBV is a running total from an arbitrary starting point, so its absolute level carries no information — only its direction, its trend, and where it sits against its own recent history. Useful conditions are relative ones: OBV at a 26-week high, rising for five bars, or diverging from price.
What is the difference between OBV and accumulation/distribution?
OBV assigns the whole day's volume to one side based on whether the close was up or down. A/D splits each day's volume by where the close sat within the day's high-low range, so a stock that closes up but near its low still records selling pressure. A/D is finer-grained; OBV is simpler and blunter.