Trading knowledge libraryWhat Is a Pending OrderMarket Basics
Market Basics
What Is a Pending Order
A pending order is an order that waits for the market to reach a price you chose, instead of filling now. This paper shows you the four kinds and how to tell them apart, how one of them waited seventeen hours on a real day before it became a trade, the three ways to set how long it may wait, what it is while it waits, and where it is placed on your platform.
A pending order is any order that does not fill now. You write a price on it, and it waits — an hour, a day, a week — until the market reaches that price, and only then does a trade open. A market order, by contrast, fills the moment you click. There are four kinds, and two questions tell them apart. Do you mean to buy or to sell? And is your price better than the current one or worse? Better is a limit, the hook: a buy limit below the price, a sell limit above it. Worse is a stop, the tripwire: a buy stop above the price, a sell stop below. A pip is the fourth decimal place of the price, so at 1.15872 a buy limit at 1.15842 is three pips below.
One that waited seventeen hours
Here is a pending order on a real day. At midnight on 28 August 2026 the euro against the dollar opened at 1.16530, and a sell limit was placed at 1.16560, three pips above. A sell limit is a hook above the price: it sells only if the price rises to it. For sixteen hours the price stayed below the line, and the order was nothing but a line on the chart. In the 17:00 hour the price rose to 1.16589, reached the line, and the order became a sell at 1.16560. It had waited seventeen hours. The day then fell to a close of 1.15820, with the trade open from the moment the line was reached.
