---
title: How wide should a crypto stop loss be? What the data shows
url: https://comparand.xyz/blog/stop-loss-distance-crypto-data
description: On Binance Bitcoin, a price 2% below was touched within a day 39.29% of the time, 1% below 63.54%. See 10 coins, ATR distances and what wicks do.
updated: '2026-10-21'
category: How-to
---

# How wide should a crypto stop loss be? What the data shows

On Binance Bitcoin, a price 2% below was touched within a day 39.29% of the time, 1% below 63.54%. See 10 coins, ATR distances and what wicks do.

On Binance Bitcoin perps, price touched a level 2% below an hourly close within the next 24 hours in 39.29% of cases, 1% below in 63.54% and 3% below in 24.24%. Across 10 big coins the same 2% ranged from 35.82% (TRX) to 65.11% (AVAX), but a level 2 ATR below (twice the coin's recent average hourly range) was touched in 50.19% to 52.89% of cases for every coin.

These are past cases, not a forecast. This article shows how often each distance was touched. It does not tell you where to put a stop.

For turning a stop distance into a position size, see [Crypto position sizing by volatility](https://comparand.xyz/blog/position-sizing-by-volatility).

## What is a stop loss, and what did we measure?

A **stop loss** is an order that closes your trade if price moves against you by a set distance. A trader who is **long** gains when price rises, so the stop sits below the entry. A trader who is **short** gains when price falls, so the stop sits above.

We did not test a strategy. We measured one thing: from each hourly close, how often did price touch a level X% below (or above) within the next 1, 4 or 24 hours? A **bar** is the open, high, low and close price over a set time. We used the hourly low and high to see touches, including touches inside the hour.

The data is Binance USDT perps (futures contracts that never expire) for 10 big coins, from September 2019 to October 20, 2026. Bitcoin alone has 62,333 hourly start points for the 24-hour test.

## How often was a stop 1%, 2%, 3% or 5% away touched?

This table is Binance BTCUSDT, for a long (a level below the close).

| Distance below the close | Touched within 1 hour | Within 4 hours | Within 24 hours | Within 168 hours (a week) |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1% | 9.41% | 28.44% | 63.54% | 86.42% |
| 2% | 2.16% | 10.18% | 39.29% | 74.44% |
| 3% | 0.75% | 4.38% | 24.24% | 62.80% |
| 5% | 0.19% | 1.25% | 9.91% | 42.94% |

For a short (a level above the close), the 24-hour results were nearly the same: 64.15% at 1%, 39.05% at 2% and 24.27% at 3%.

The longer you wait, the more likely a touch is. Going from 1% to 3% cut the 24-hour touch rate from 63.54% to 24.24%, but each touch would cost three times as much.

*Diagram: A chart of touch share against stop distance for Binance BTCUSDT, with one line each for 1 hour, 4 hours and 24 hours.*
## Why does the same percent mean different things for different coins?

Coins move by different amounts. Here is the 24-hour touch rate for a level 2% below the close, for all 10 coins.

The middle column is the **ATR** (average true range): the average size of the last 14 hourly bars from low to high, counting any gap from the previous close. We show its median as a percent of price. The last column measures the stop distance in ATRs instead of percent: 2 ATR below the close.

| Coin (Binance perp) | Median 14-hour ATR | 2% below, within 24 hours | 2 ATR below, within 24 hours |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| TRX | 0.64% | 35.82% | 50.19% |
| BTC | 0.73% | 39.29% | 50.76% |
| BNB | 0.86% | 45.09% | 51.21% |
| ETH | 0.98% | 49.99% | 51.18% |
| XRP | 1.06% | 55.02% | 51.29% |
| DOGE | 1.22% | 59.94% | 51.66% |
| ADA | 1.25% | 61.12% | 52.10% |
| LINK | 1.35% | 62.70% | 51.45% |
| SOL | 1.40% | 64.12% | 52.23% |
| AVAX | 1.40% | 65.11% | 52.89% |

A fixed 2% went from 35.82% (TRX) to 65.11% (AVAX), while 2 ATR stayed between 50.19% and 52.89%. Other sizes match: 1 ATR was touched in 71.70% to 74.89% of 24-hour windows, and 3 ATR in 33.95% to 35.78%.

So when the distance was set in recent ranges, the chance of a touch was almost the same for every coin. A fixed percent hides that.

## Does the same percent mean the same thing in every year?

No. A level 2% below the close on Binance Bitcoin was touched within 24 hours in 59.10% of cases in 2021 and in 27.07% in 2023. (2019 is a partial year, so it is left out.)

| Year | Median 14-hour ATR | 2% below, within 24 hours | 2 ATR below, within 24 hours |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 2020 | 0.80% | 39.21% | 45.16% |
| 2021 | 1.17% | 59.10% | 51.27% |
| 2022 | 0.85% | 46.24% | 54.00% |
| 2023 | 0.56% | 27.07% | 49.85% |
| 2024 | 0.72% | 37.72% | 49.39% |
| 2025 | 0.57% | 30.84% | 51.47% |
| 2026 (to October 20) | 0.58% | 30.84% | 53.20% |

In calm years (2023, 2025) a 2% level was far from price. In 2021 it was close. The ATR version stayed between 45.16% and 54.00%.

## How do wicks cause so many touches?

A **wick** is the thin line on a candle above or below its body. The body runs from open to close. The wick shows how far price went beyond that before returning.

Binance BTCUSDT hourly bars had a median body of 0.23% and a median high-to-low range of 0.64%. The wicks made up a median 59.09% of the range. In 61.82% of hourly bars the two wicks together were longer than the body.

On daily bars the median range was 3.74% and the median body 1.37%.

This is why stops get touched more often than a closing-price chart suggests. A stop inside a bar's range can be reached by a wick, even if the bar closes far from it. See our guide to [long wicks](https://comparand.xyz/blog/crypto-long-wicks-explained-data).

## What does this data not show?

- It does not show what happened after a touch. Price may have kept going or may have returned. We did not measure that.
- It does not show a result for any strategy, entry or exit.
- It uses last-trade bars. Your exchange may trigger stops on another price, such as a mark price (a smoothed reference price). We did not model that.
- It ignores fees, funding payments, and the worse prices a stop order can get in a fast market.
- Every hour is a start point, so windows overlap. The number of independent cases is far smaller than the 62,333 hours.
- The 10 coins are large coins that still trade, not a random sample of all coins.

## What is the trade-off in plain words?

A closer stop is touched far more often, but each touch costs less. A wider stop is touched less often, but each touch costs more.

For Bitcoin over a day, 1% was touched in about six of ten cases and 3% in about one of four. What fits you depends on how much you can lose on one trade and how long you plan to stay in. In our data, a distance set in ATRs gave nearly the same touch rate across coins and years. Our guide to [sizing a trade by volatility](https://comparand.xyz/blog/position-sizing-by-volatility) uses the same idea for trade size.

For a related risk, see [how often 10x or 20x leverage would get liquidated](https://comparand.xyz/blog/how-much-leverage-liquidation-odds).

## How we measured this

For every hourly close, we looked at the next 1, 4, 24 and 168 hourly bars. For a long, we counted a case when the lowest low in that window was at or below the close times (1 minus the distance). For a short, we used the highest high. Windows with a missing bar were dropped. For the ATR version, ATR is the simple average of the last 14 true ranges of closed hourly bars, known at the close. We also measured body and wick size on Binance hourly, 4-hour and daily bars. We used no fees, because this is not a trading rule.

## Try this in Comparand

Ask your connected AI agent: "Get Binance BTCUSDT perp hourly bars for my chosen dates. For each close, tell me whether the low in the next 24 bars went 2% below it, and show the share."

- **venue_bars** returns the open, high, low and close price plus volume for each completed bar. Use the 1h interval and the perp kind. It is free on every key.
- Your agent counts the touches. The tool returns prices only.

If your stops fill on Hyperliquid, ask: "Here are my fills: coin, time in milliseconds, price, side and fee in bp. Show how each did 60 seconds later."

- **hl_fills_markout** returns fill markouts for the fills you pass in, after the number of seconds you choose. A call takes up to 5,000 fills. It costs $0.30 per 1,000 fills from your credits, with a minimum of $0.02.
- This shows whether price kept moving or came back after your stop filled. Our guide to [trade markouts](https://comparand.xyz/blog/trading-markouts-explained) explains how to read it.

You can [try 3 coins free](https://comparand.xyz/try), see the [tool docs](https://comparand.xyz/docs), or check [pricing](https://comparand.xyz/pricing). These are past cases, not a forecast.

## The short version

- On Binance Bitcoin, a level 1%, 2% or 3% below was touched within 24 hours in 63.54%, 39.29% and 24.24% of cases.
- Within one hour, the same levels were touched in 9.41%, 2.16% and 0.75%.
- A fixed 2% ranged from 35.82% to 65.11% across 10 coins, but 2 ATR stayed between 50.19% and 52.89%.
- Wicks are long: they were longer than the body in 61.82% of hourly Bitcoin bars.
- These are touches, not outcomes. Past cases, not a forecast.

## Questions people ask

**How often does a 2% stop loss get hit in crypto?**

On Binance Bitcoin perps, price touched a level 2% below an hourly close within the next 24 hours in 39.29% of cases, and within the next hour in 2.16%. A level 2% above the close (for a short) was touched in 39.05% of 24-hour cases.

**Is a fixed percent stop the same for every coin?**

No. A level 2% below was touched within 24 hours in 35.82% of TRX cases and 65.11% of AVAX cases. Coins move by different amounts, so the same percent means a different distance.

**What is ATR and why use it for stop distance?**

ATR (average true range) is the average size of the last 14 hourly bars from low to high. A level 2 ATR below was touched within 24 hours in 50.19% to 52.89% of cases across 10 coins, a much narrower range than a fixed percent gives.

**Can this data tell me where to put my stop?**

No. It shows how often price touched a distance in the past. It does not show whether price came back afterward, and it is not a forecast. The choice depends on your own risk.