You’ve always been able to use AI to help build custom indicators. What no tool could do until now is actually open your TrendSpider chart, run the indicator, and verify it behaves the way you described. Sidekick changes that. It goes into TrendSpider’s AI coding assistant, manages the entire build process for you, and checks the actual rendered output after every step, catching its own mistakes and correcting course automatically until the indicator does what you asked.
What Is Sidekick Agentic Coding?
TrendSpider’s AI coding assistant is still the go-to for small edits and quick indicator tweaks, and it costs no credits to use. Sidekick’s agentic coding is built for something different: complex, multi-step builds powered by top models like Claude that plan, execute, and verify the output at every stage.
- What it is: Sidekick goes into the AI coding assistant and takes control of the Custom JS indicator editor, breaking your request into a series of steps, executing each one, and then reviewing the actual indicator screenshot and logs to confirm the result matches your intent. If something is off, it self-corrects and tries again without any additional input from you.
- How it works under the hood: Sidekick uses the AI coding assistant as its engine in the backend, which is exactly what makes it more capable than anything built outside of TrendSpider. Because it’s trained on TrendSpider’s scripting rules and can see what the indicator actually produces, it can catch and fix problems that a general-purpose tool operating on code alone would never even know existed.
- Why it beats general-purpose agentic coding tools: Tools like Cursor or Claude Code are powerful, but they evaluate code. Sidekick evaluates the actual rendered indicator after every step, checking whether the output looks and behaves the way you described, not just whether the syntax is correct. This is only possible because Sidekick is built directly into TrendSpider, trained on TrendSpider’s scripting rules, and can see exactly what the indicator produces in real time. Claude is the recommended model for agentic coding, though Gemini and OpenAI are also available.
What You Can Build
Agentic coding works across all custom indicator types, from lower panel histograms to on-chart overlay tables to candle-level visual logic. Here are three indicators built entirely through Sidekick prompts to show the range of what’s possible.
- Drawdown From ATH %: Lower panel indicator that plots red histogram bars showing how far price is below the all-time high as a percentage.
- Returns Overlay Table: Overlay table showing % returns across DTD, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD, and 1-year timeframes, color-coded by performance.
- VIX Candle Coloring: Overlay that colors price candles based on current VIX level, from deep red at peak fear to green when volatility is low.
Drawdown From ATH %
The Drawdown From ATH % is a lower indicator that plots red histogram bars showing how far the current price is below the asset’s all-time high as a percentage. It’s a clean, at-a-glance read on where you are in a drawdown cycle, useful for evaluating entries, sizing risk, or simply understanding where an asset stands relative to its peak.
Returns Overlay Table
The Returns Overlay Table is an overlay indicator that displays a clean, structured table directly on your price chart showing the % return of any asset across six timeframes: day-to-date, week-to-date, month-to-date, quarter-to-date, year-to-date, and 1 year. Each row is individually toggleable, returns are formatted to two decimal places, and values are color-coded green when positive and red when negative, giving you a full performance snapshot right on your chart without switching views.
VIX Candle Coloring
The VIX Candle Coloring indicator colors your price candles based on where the CBOE Volatility Index is trading at that moment. Deep red above a VIX of 50, stepping through orange-red, amber, and cyan as volatility cools, and green when VIX is below 20. You get an instant read on the macro fear environment without needing to pull up a separate VIX chart alongside your price data.
A Few Things Worth Knowing
- Saving your indicator. When Sidekick builds a custom indicator, it saves to your account automatically. The indicator name is set in the first line of the generated code with
describe_indicator('Indicator Name Here');and can be changed by editing that line directly. You can also tell Sidekick what to name it in your original prompt and it will handle it from the start. - Editing an existing indicator in a new session. If you want to come back and modify an indicator you’ve already built, open it in the Custom JS editor before prompting Sidekick. Sidekick works on whatever is currently loaded in the editor, so having the right indicator open first ensures your edits land in the right place and don’t affect a different indicator by mistake.
- Sharing and monetizing your indicators. Any custom indicator you build can be published to the TrendSpider Store with a title and description. You can offer it free to the TrendSpider community or put it behind a paywall and earn directly from the platform, making it possible to turn the indicators you build into a real revenue stream.
- Sidekick credits vs. the AI coding assistant. Building with Sidekick uses credits, which is worth keeping in mind for larger or more complex builds. For smaller edits and quick tweaks to existing indicators, the AI coding assistant in the custom indicator editor is still there and free to use, no credits required. It’s the right tool when you know exactly what change you need and a single prompt is likely to get it right.
Start Building the Indicators You’ve Always Wanted
Custom indicators used to be out of reach for traders who weren’t developers. Sidekick removes that barrier entirely, not by generating code and leaving you to troubleshoot it, but by going into the AI coding assistant, managing the entire build process, checking its own work, and delivering a finished indicator that does what you asked. Open Sidekick, describe the indicator you’ve always wanted, and let it build.
