Price on 12 October 2026 at 09:20 UTC: 15.44 points, up 4.04% since the previous close. High of the session in progress 15.53, low 15.36.
The VIX closed the Friday, 9 October 2026 session at 14.84 points, down 3.70% on the session. Over one year the price is down 9.68%, between a low of 13.38 on 24 December 2025 and a high of 35.30 on 9 March 2026.
Price read on 12 October 2026 at 09:20 UTC and updated during the day, not a real-time quote. The statistics are computed over one year of closed sessions, the last one being 9 October 2026.
To tie these numbers to your own trading: the lesson on the ATR, where to place a stop loss and how to calculate a position size.
Source: CNBC
Daily close (line), range between each session's high and low (band), high and low of the year (dots), last close (dashed). Index level in points, from 9 October 2025 to 9 October 2026.
Out of the 259 sessions of the year, 35.9% closed above their open.
A session's range is the distance between its high and its low. Over the last 20 sessions, the VIX's range averaged 1.08, or 6.76% of its opening level; 1.43 (8.37%) over 90 sessions and 2.01 (10.40%) over one year, in index points. It is the same idea as the ATR, computed here on the daily candle without smoothing opening gaps.
The VIX cannot be bought or held: according to Cboe, what trades is VIX futures and VIX options, which have their own prices. Half the average range of the last 90 sessions is 0.71 in index points, or 4.19% of the index level: it is an order of magnitude of what the index covers in a session, not the distance of a stop on one of those products.
The full reasoning, with the percentage of capital and the reward-to-risk ratio, is in calculating position size and where to place your stop loss.
Source: CNBC
The three most active hours are highlighted, the three quietest greyed out. Tallest bar: 2.943%.
Average range of each UTC hour, as a percentage of the hour's opening price, over 905 hourly candles from 13 July 2026 to 9 October 2026. The three most active hours are 13:00, 14:00 and 15:00 UTC, that is 14:00, 15:00 and 16:00 in London and 9:00, 10:00 and 11:00 in New York. The three quietest: 7:00, 9:00 and 10:00 UTC, that is 8:00, 10:00 and 11:00 in London and 3:00, 5:00 and 6:00 in New York.
Outside those hours the VIX is not published: the histogram shows no bar there.
Reading by major sessions (Asia, London, New York) does not apply to the VIX: it is published over two consecutive Cboe sessions, early in the morning and then through the New York trading day. What the histogram shows is the shape of that day, from the first value to the last.
According to Cboe, the VIX is calculated from 3:15 a.m. to 9:25 a.m. Eastern time, then from 9:30 a.m. to 4:15 p.m.: the most active hours found above, that is 14:00, 15:00 and 16:00 in London and 9:00, 10:00 and 11:00 in New York, are to be read against the 9:30 a.m. open in New York. Hourly bars are cut on the full hour: the first one only covers 3:15 to 4:00 a.m., the last one 4:00 to 4:15 p.m.
| Day | Average range | Up sessions | Sessions |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monday | 9.28% | 26.9% | 52 |
| Tuesday | 9.13% | 40.4% | 52 |
| Wednesday | 10.33% | 46.2% | 52 |
| Thursday | 11.68% | 39.2% | 51 |
| Friday | 11.63% | 26.9% | 52 |
Over the 259 sessions of the year, average range and share of up sessions, day by day. Thursday was the widest day, Wednesday the one that most often closed higher. This is an observation on one year of data, not a rule: next year can reverse the order.
Change from the open of the first day to the close of the last day of each month. Best month: January 2026 (+17.44%). Worst month: April 2026 (-30.49%).
The VIX is not a price: it is a calculation derived from the prices of S&P 500 options. Nothing here is a forecast or advice.
The VIX, or Cboe Volatility Index, is according to the Cboe FAQ a market estimate of the expected volatility of the S&P 500: it measures how much the market thinks the index will fluctuate over the following 30 days, using the midpoint of bid and ask quotes of S&P 500 options (SPX options).
It is a forward-looking measure: Cboe contrasts it with realized volatility, which measures the variability of past prices (same page). The level of the VIX says what option prices imply, not what happened.
Only SPX options with Friday expirations and more than 23 days and less than 37 days to expiration enter the calculation, weighted to yield a constant 30-day measure; intraday values are based on snapshots of the quotes every 15 seconds (same page).
The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis carries the index's daily close in its FRED database and describes it as the market expectation of near-term volatility conveyed by stock index option prices (FRED, series VIXCLS).
The VIX cannot be held: it is priced on a constantly changing portfolio of SPX options, which traders cannot buy and hold (Cboe). What trades is VIX futures, on Cboe Futures Exchange, and VIX options, on Cboe Options.
VIX futures are the futures contracts on the VIX, traded on Cboe Futures Exchange under the symbol VX. According to their contract specifications, the contract multiplier is $1,000 per index point, and the minimum price interval is 0.05 points, equal to $50 per contract.
A monthly contract settles on the Wednesday that is 30 days prior to the third Friday of the calendar month following the month in which it expires, and trading in an expiring contract ends at 8:00 a.m. Chicago time on that day (same page).
This page does not follow a futures contract: it follows the index itself (VIX), which closed the 9 October 2026 session at 14.84 points. A VIX futures contract has its own price, which is not the index level: the range and hours above are those of the index.
Tradoshi's backtesting module, in beta, replays a market candle by candle without showing what comes next, spread, slippage and commissions included, and it is included from the Pro plan. It is the most direct way to check whether a stop rule based on range holds over the past year. To understand the method first: what is backtesting and backtesting stocks, forex and futures.
The journal does the other half of the work: it measures your own trades on VIX, their real R against the stop you placed and the hours when you win or lose, on your executed orders rather than on averages. Every statistic is defined in the glossary.
At 14.84 points at the close of the 9 October 2026 session, according to CNBC data, down 3.70% versus the previous close. This is the level of the index itself, calculated during its exchange's hours, not the price of a CFD or a futures contract, which also trade outside those hours. This page does not show a real-time quote: it shows the last dated close and statistics computed over one year.
On average 1.43 between a session's high and low over the last 90 sessions, in index points, or 8.37% of the opening level; 2.01 (10.40%) over one year.
On the hourly candles from 13 July 2026 to 9 October 2026, the widest UTC hours were 13:00, 14:00 and 15:00, that is 14:00, 15:00 and 16:00 in London and 9:00, 10:00 and 11:00 in New York. The quietest: 7:00, 9:00 and 10:00 UTC.
From the daily and hourly bars published by CNBC, sessions Monday to Friday. The calculation dates from 12 October 2026 and the last session taken into account is 9 October 2026; the figures are recomputed at each rebuild of the site.
Yes. VIX is the symbol of the Cboe Volatility Index, calculated and administered by Cboe Global Indices according to Cboe; FRED, the St. Louis Fed database, lists the Chicago Board Options Exchange as the source of the series. The index closed the 9 October 2026 session at 14.84 points.
Not directly. According to Cboe, the index is priced on a constantly changing portfolio of S&P 500 options, which cannot be bought and held. What trades is VIX futures and VIX options.