MNQ 15-Minute Range by Time of Day
How much does the Micro E-mini Nasdaq-100 actually move on the 15-minute chart at different times of day? The table below is measured from 1,584 recorded 15-minute bars across 5 recent sessions: for each hour of the day, the average distance between a bar's high and its low.
| Hour | Avg 15-minute range | |
|---|---|---|
| 9:00 AM ET | 11.96 pts | |
| 10:00 AM ET | 11.87 pts | |
| 2:00 PM ET | 5.61 pts | |
| 3:00 PM ET | 6.66 pts | |
| 4:00 PM ET | 3.30 pts | |
| 6:00 PM ET | 3.51 pts | |
| 7:00 PM ET | 6.60 pts |
How to read this
The most active hours in this window were 9:00 AM, 10:00 AM, 3:00 PM ET, and the quietest were 4:00 PM and 6:00 PM ET. A wider bar means each interval covers more ground. The takeaway is purely observational: a fixed number of points represents a very different share of typical movement at different hours — in this window, the most active hour covered roughly 4× the ground of the quietest.
These figures shift with volatility regimes — they describe the recorded window above, not a guarantee of the next session.
