Volume bubbles are circles drawn on a price chart at the price and time of each large trade, so big trades stand out at a glance. On most charts, a bigger bubble means more contracts traded, and its color shows which side crossed the spread, buyers or sellers. Quant Data Futures draws them for large trades and sweeps on its Depth Map, on top of a heat map of the orders resting in the book.
Checked November 10, 2026. Example: ES December 2026 futures (ESZ6) on September 29, 2026, in Quant Data Futures. Times are Eastern (ET).
Quant Data Futures Depth Map, ES (ESZ6), September 29, 2026, about 10:40 to 11:35 AM ET. Bright bands are orders resting in the book; the bubbles on the candles are large trades. The white outline and dashed boxes are added marks; the lower box is a second band of bids, at 7,715.00. The 7,738.25 tag on the price axis is the session’s last price.
Key takeaways
Each platform sets its own rules. Size, color and what counts as large differ from chart to chart, so check the legend.
Not every bubble is one trade. Some chart indicators size a bubble by a whole bar’s volume.
In Quant Data Futures, the Depth Map’s volume bubbles share one page with the tape, footprint chart and DOM. It’s a browser-based futures order flow platform, with CME data included.
What do the size and color of volume bubbles mean?
On most charts, a bubble’s size shows how many contracts traded, and its color shows which side crossed the spread.
Size. A bigger bubble usually means a bigger trade. Some platforms scale bubbles against the market’s normal trade size, others against the largest trade on screen.
Color. Usually the aggressor, the side that traded right away: one color when buyers lift the offer (buy from the sellers resting at the offer), another when sellers hit the bid. Green and red are common; some platforms use blue and pink.
What counts as large. Each platform decides, and many let you set it. Normal size also changes through the day: a print that stands out at 3 AM may be routine at 10 AM.
Illustration, no real data.
Volume bubbles vs footprint chart, tape and heat map: what’s the difference?
Volume bubbles show where big trades happened. The tape and footprint chart give the numbers behind them, and a liquidity heat map or DOM shows the resting orders those trades ran into.
Tool | What it shows | Trades or resting orders? | In Quant Data Futures |
Volume bubbles | Large trades, drawn at the price and time they traded | Trades | On the Futures Depth Map |
Footprint chart | The volume at every price inside each bar, split by aggressor | Trades | Futures Footprint |
Tape (time and sales) | Every trade, one row each: time, price, size and aggressor side | Trades | Futures Order Flow |
Liquidity heat map | The resting order book drawn over time | Resting orders | Futures Depth Map |
DOM (depth of market) | A price ladder of the bids and offers resting at each price right now | Resting orders | Futures DOM |
One catch: some chart indicators draw one bubble per bar, sized by the bar’s total volume, so the bubble marks a busy bar rather than one large trade.
The Quant Data Futures DOM also flags icebergs and pulls; see How to See Iceberg Orders in ES Futures and What is Market Depth?.
A real example: a 655-lot ES buy on September 29, 2026
On Tuesday, September 29, 2026, the largest single ES print of the regular session (9:30 AM to 4:00 PM ET) was a buy of 655 contracts, a 655-lot in trader shorthand. That’s about $253 million in notional value (655 x $50 x 7,730).
1. The bubble. In the Depth Map picture above, the upper dashed box is a band of bids that rested at 7,730.00 from about 10:43 to 11:05. It was brightest just before price reached it, then gone. Four minutes later, at 11:09, the 655-lot’s bubble appeared at that same price. By then, 7,730.00 was on the offer side, so the bubble marks a buy, not those earlier bids being filled.
2. The tape. At 11:09:48 AM, a buyer lifted the offer for 655 ES contracts at 7,730.00.
Futures Order Flow (the tape) in Quant Data, September 29, 2026, filtered by size, so it shows other CME contracts too, not just ES. The solid box is the trade behind the 11:09 bubble; the dashed boxes are two other ES buys that morning, at 11:00:01 and 11:57:49 AM.
3. The footprint. The trade sits in the 11:05 AM bar, which covers 11:05 to 11:10. Its 7,730.00 row, the bar’s point of control (its most traded price), reads +539 delta (aggressive buying minus aggressive selling) on 2,125 contracts, the 655-lot included. The whole bar finished at +629 delta, yet it closed lower than it opened. Without the 655-lot, which printed 11 seconds before the bar closed, the bar’s delta would have been -26: one trade turned a bar of net selling into one that reads as buying.
Futures Footprint in Quant Data: ES five-minute bars, September 29, 2026, 11:00 to 11:15 AM ET. Each row shows delta, then total volume, at that price. The dashed row is the 11:00 bar’s +583 at 7,738.00; the POC 7,731.00 tag on the right is for the whole session.
4. What came next. Within 15 minutes, ES traded about 14 points lower, and by CME’s 5:00 PM ET daily break it was back at 7,738.25, above the print.
Big as it was, the 655-lot was about 3% of the roughly 19,870 contracts traded in its five-minute bar. For the same morning minute by minute, see What is Order Flow Trading?.
How do traders read volume bubbles?
Traders read a bubble against the price it sits at: what was resting there, how much traded and what price did next.
Note the bubble’s price and time.
Check what was resting there: a bright band on the heat map, or very little?
Read the exact size and side on the tape.
Watch whether price holds at that level or moves through it. Heavy trading into resting size that doesn’t give way is what traders call absorption.
Compare the size with normal trading for that hour.
Do volume bubbles tell you where price will go?
No. A volume bubble records a trade that already happened; it isn’t a forecast. A big buy can be a hedge, a short being closed or one piece of a larger order, and the bubble looks the same in each case. The 655-lot above was followed by a drop and then a recovery. Treat a bubble as a price worth watching, not as a direction.
How do you see volume bubbles in Quant Data Futures?
Volume bubbles are on the Futures Depth Map:
Log in at v3.quantdata.us and open the built-in Futures page.
To add the Depth Map to another page, click the + icon at the top right of a tool tab to open Add Tool, choose the Futures tab and pick Futures Depth Map (more on Add Tool).
For the exact size and side behind a bubble, add Futures Order Flow (the tape) beside it, and Futures Footprint for the volume and delta at that price in each bar.
Why use Quant Data Futures for volume bubbles?
Quant Data Futures is a browser-based futures order flow platform. Its Depth Map draws volume bubbles for large trades and sweeps on top of the resting order book, and it shares one page with the tape, a footprint chart and a DOM that flags icebergs.
Nothing to install: it runs in a browser tab on Mac or Windows.
Two plans: Futures is $74.99 a month and Options + Futures is $119.99 a month. New members start with a 7-day free trial.
A data company traders already use: Quant Data has 20,000+ members in its community and six years delivering licensed options data.
FAQ
What are volume bubbles?
Volume bubbles are circles on a chart that mark large trades at the price and time they happened. Some chart indicators draw bubbles from a whole bar’s volume instead, so check whether a bubble marks one trade or a busy bar.
Are volume bubbles the same as a big trades indicator?
Mostly, yes, for bubbles drawn from trades. A big trades indicator, trade bubbles and order flow bubbles are different names for the same idea: marks for large trades where they printed. Some tools merge a quick run of prints into one mark; others show each print.
Do volume bubbles work on futures?
Yes, and futures suit them. CME data marks which side crossed the spread on nearly every trade, and ES trades on one exchange, CME, with a single order book for each contract month. A US stock trades on more than a dozen venues, and consolidated stock trade feeds carry no aggressor flag.
Do volume bubbles show sweeps?
On Quant Data’s Depth Map, yes: volume bubbles mark large trades and sweeps, each with its own style in the legend. In futures, a sweep is one aggressive order that trades through two or more price levels at once, filling against the resting orders at each. In Quant Data, Futures Order Flow (the tape) shows sweep depth: how many levels a trade took out.
Can you tell who placed the trade behind a volume bubble?
No. CME market data is anonymous, so no bubble, tape or order book shows who placed an order or why.
Is a volume bubble the same as a GEX bubble map?
No. Volume bubbles mark trades in one market. A GEX bubble map, such as Quant Data’s Interval Map, draws options gamma exposure by strike over time; see What is a GEX Bubble Map? How Quant Data Created It.
I have not signed up for Quant Data. How do I?
If you want to see volume bubbles on the Depth Map next to the tape, footprint chart and DOM, click here to start your 7-day free trial. CME data is included with no exchange fees, and Quant Data Futures runs in your web browser. Click on Learn More if you would like to learn more about what we offer.
Would you like further assistance?
If you have any questions or need further assistance, please don’t hesitate to reach out to the Quant Data team at support@quantdata.us or via our live chat located on the bottom right-hand corner of your screen. We are available on our live chat between 9:30 AM and 5:00 PM (eastern time), Monday through Friday.