summary: how to pick the right session on edgeful based on the hours you actually trade — with a timezone-aware table, a quick decision tree, and how to build a custom session when none of the built-ins fit. reflects the recent timezone update, where each built-in session now runs in its local timezone instead of Eastern.

edgeful runs on sessions. every report, every level, every IB and ORB window is anchored to one. the single biggest reason a report looks "empty" or "wrong" is that the session you've selected doesn't match the hours you're actually at your desk.

this article is a decision guide — pick a session whose window is still open during your trading hours, and your reports will line up with what you see on the chart.

if you haven't read the foundations yet, start with sessions overview — it covers what each session is, the reference close, day rollover, and the full timezone update. this article picks up from there.

edgeful used to calculate every session in Eastern time (UTC-4). no matter where you were in the world, London was 3:00 AM – 11:00 AM ET and Asian was 7:00 PM – 4:00 AM ET on the platform.

that's changed. each built-in session now runs in its own local timezone:

on most days the old and new sessions line up almost perfectly. the exception is the few days each year when the US and Europe shift their clocks on different dates — on those days you'll see minor differences in session open, close, high, and low. neither is "wrong," they're just measuring slightly different windows.

if you trade the NY session only, nothing changes for you. if you trade London, Asian, or build custom sessions, the timezone update is what this article is really about — it makes picking the right session for your local hours far simpler.

for the full breakdown, see time zones on edgeful in the sessions overview.

pick a session whose window overlaps the hours you're actually trading.

that's it. if you sit down at 9:00 AM local time and the session you've selected ended 4 hours ago, the IB report has nothing live to show you — the first hour of that session already closed, the levels are set, and you're looking at history.

you want a session that's in progress (or just about to start) when you're at the screen.

here's when each built-in session is live post-timezone-update, translated into common timezones. the source-of-truth column is in bold — that's the local timezone the session is actually anchored to on edgeful.

times shift by an hour around daylight saving transitions — and because the US and Europe shift on different dates, there's a short window each spring and fall where London's ET column will look an hour off. use the session as the anchor, not the clock time.

if you trade IB or ORB setups, the window you actually care about is smaller than the full session:

the IB or ORB window has to be open — or just about to open — when you're at your desk. if you're in Spain starting at 9:00 AM CET, London IB runs 9:00–10:00 AM CET. you're live. if you're targeting NY IB from Spain, that's 3:30–4:30 PM CET — your afternoon, not your morning.

use your local trading hours to pick a starting session. you can always change it per report later.

this is the most common ticket we see from traders outside Eastern time. the symptom: you open the IB report, everything looks normal on the data side, but the "in play" status is closed and the chart doesn't have a live IB window drawn.

the cause: the session you've selected already closed its IB window hours before you sat down.

example — you're in Madrid (CET), sit down to trade at 9:00 AM local, and the report is on the NY session. NY IB runs 9:30–10:30 AM ET, which is 3:30–4:30 PM CET. your morning is 6+ hours before NY IB even opens. the fix is to switch to the London session (with the timezone update, IB runs 9:00–10:00 AM CET) or build a custom session around your actual hours.

same pattern for ORB — if your ORB window says "closed" and you're staring at a chart that's clearly mid-session, your session is probably pointing at the wrong one for your timezone.

if the 4 built-ins don't match when you trade, you can build your own. the timezone update added a timezone picker to custom sessions — so the start and end times you enter are in whatever timezone you choose, not forced into Eastern.

a few practical custom sessions traders have built post-update:

some traders preferred the pre-update behavior — every session in Eastern time, no conversions. you can recreate that exactly with custom sessions.

the key is picking UTC-4 (New York) as the timezone and using the old start/end times:

both the built-in and ET-anchored versions are accurate — they're just measuring slightly different windows on DST-transition days. pick whichever matches how you think about your trading day and stick with it.

once you've picked a session, the last step is making sure your TradingView indicators are using the same timezone as the session in edgeful. this matters more than ever after the timezone update.

if your edgeful session is Europe/London 8:00 AM – 4:00 PM, your TradingView session indicator needs to be Europe/London 8:00 AM – 4:00 PM too. if edgeful is on London local time and TradingView is still on Eastern (the old default), the plotted levels won't match edgeful — and the data will look broken when it's really just a timezone mismatch.

same rule for custom sessions — whatever timezone you picked when you built the session, set your TradingView indicator to that same timezone.

the market sessions indicator on TradingView is useful here — it draws the session boxes on your chart so you can confirm visually that both sides are looking at the same candles.

for the full walkthrough on matching timezones across edgeful and TradingView, see matching the timezone in your TradingView indicators in sessions (reports).