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Build a Scan

Learn how to create your first scan in Scanz — from adding filters to saving your work, plus a complete guide to filter operators.

Building Your First Scan

Creating a scan is straightforward: add filters one by one until you’re finding exactly the stocks you want to trade.

Starting from Scratch

  1. Click the ”+ Filter” button (or “Customize filters” if viewing a prebuilt)
  2. Select a filter category, then the specific filter
  3. Choose your operator (greater than, less than, between, etc.)
  4. Enter your value
  5. The results update immediately - watch the count change as you tune

Each filter you add narrows your results. Start broad and add filters until the result count is manageable (10-50 stocks is usually ideal). If you see zero results, you’ve over-filtered - remove or loosen constraints.

Starting from a Prebuilt

Prebuilt scans give you a tested starting point. Load one from the sidebar, then click “Customize filters” to create an editable copy. Scanz will prompt you to name your custom version. From there, add, remove, or modify any filter to match your strategy.

This is often the fastest path to a working scan - find a prebuilt close to what you need, then adapt it.

Saving Your Work

Once you’ve built a scan worth keeping, click Actions > Save Scan (for custom scans you own) or Actions > Duplicate Scan (to save a modified prebuilt). Your scans appear under “My Scans” in the sidebar and persist across sessions.

Filter Operators

Every filter supports comparison operators that control how values are evaluated:

Greater than (>) and Greater than or equal (>=) find stocks above your threshold. “Volume >= 500000” returns stocks with at least 500K shares traded.

Less than (<) and Less than or equal (<=) find stocks below your threshold. “Price <= 20” returns stocks at $20 or cheaper.

Between specifies a range. “Price between 5 and 50” returns stocks in that window.

Equal (=) matches exact values, primarily used for categorical filters like Exchange.

Comparing to Other Fields

Some filters let you compare against other metrics rather than fixed numbers - this is where the Scanner becomes truly powerful:

  • Last Price >= VWAP finds stocks trading above their volume-weighted average price (a sign of strength)
  • Close > Open finds bullish candles where the stock closed higher than it opened
  • High >= SMA 20 finds stocks whose high touched or exceeded their 20-day moving average

These dynamic comparisons adapt to each stock’s specific values rather than applying a one-size-fits-all threshold.