How it works
You found the stock. Which options structure fits it?
See how price structure, time, volatility, events, and liquidity narrow an options idea to five structures worth examining.
Most options tools become useful after you already know the trade you want to build. The difficult moment often comes earlier: you have found the stock, read the chart, and chosen a time horizon, but several structures could express the idea. The job is to decide what deserves a closer look before choosing strikes.
The decision gap
Why bullish or bearish is not enough
A directional view does not describe how far price may move, how quickly it must happen, what volatility may do, or how much path risk you are willing to accept. A debit spread and a credit spread can both express a bullish thesis, yet they respond differently when the move is slow, partial, early, or wrong.
The same distinction appears in neutral and volatility trades. A butterfly asks price to finish near a target. A condor allows a corridor. A long straddle needs movement large enough to overcome its cost. A protective structure may sacrifice upside or premium to change the loss profile. Choosing among them requires more than a market label.
Before comparing structures
Five questions shape the choice
- 01
What is the underlying doing?
Daily price action describes the immediate setup; weekly structure shows whether that setup is aligned with or fighting the broader trend. Both matter, and their relative weight changes with the trade horizon.
- 02
How extended is the move?
A trend near its normal range is not the same as a sharp move stretched away from recent behavior. Extension changes the case for continuation, consolidation, and mean reversion.
- 03
What happens before expiration?
Time is not just a countdown. Earnings and other events can sit inside one expiration and outside another, while longer-dated trades give a thesis more time but change sensitivity to volatility and decay.
- 04
What is the options market pricing?
Expected move, implied versus realized volatility, skew, bid/ask quality, volume, and open interest show what the market is charging for the exposure and whether the structure can be examined on a credible chain.
- 05
What must the payoff accomplish?
The trade may need directional exposure, a limited move, time decay, volatility expansion, a target zone, stock replacement, or protection. The payoff should match that job rather than merely match the word bullish or bearish.
The workflow
From market idea to a focused comparison
- 01
Select the underlying
Start with the stock or ETF already under consideration. The product does not ask you to choose a strategy first.
- 02
Read the current setup
Review price, trend, extension, earnings context, expected move, and the available expiration dates before moving forward.
- 03
Choose the exact expiration
The selected date fixes the relevant time horizon, event relationship, volatility surface, and chain quality. It is part of the thesis, not a cosmetic filter.
- 04
Compare five structures
The AI evaluates the curated strategy library against the prepared facts. The server accepts only a complete, validated five-strategy comparison.
A new date, a new analysis
Why the expiration can change the answer
Choosing another expiration does more than add or remove days. It can move earnings into or out of the trade, change which timeframe should dominate, alter implied volatility and skew, and expose a different set of liquid contracts. A structure that fits a short event-driven window may be a poor expression of a six-month thesis.
For that reason, the product does not stretch one ranking across every date. Each ticker-and-expiration pair is evaluated as its own decision context.
Where the product fits
One step between charting and payoff modeling
Charting platform
Find the underlying and understand the price setup.
Options Playbook
Compare which structures fit the setup and chosen expiration.
Payoff builder or broker
Test exact strikes, prices, scenarios, and execution details.
What the result is—and is not
The five rows are a research shortlist, not five trade instructions. Each row explains the payoff thesis and the prepared evidence that made the structure comparatively relevant. The user remains responsible for contract selection, sizing, execution, and the decision to trade or do nothing.