A whipsaw is what happens when a strategy enters on what looks like a genuine breakout or trend signal, only for price to reverse hard almost immediately, hitting the stop for a loss before any real move develops. One whipsaw is just a losing trade; a string of them, each triggered by the same signal type in quick succession, is the specific pattern that erodes a trend-following strategy's edge fastest.
Whipsaws cluster in choppy, range-bound markets by nature: every attempted breakout looks identical to a real one at the moment of entry, and it's only the market's subsequent behavior that reveals which kind it was.
This is the concrete, trade-level cost that indicators like ADX exist to reduce: filtering for confirmed trend strength before acting on a crossover or breakout signal doesn't eliminate whipsaws, but it does reduce how often a strategy pays for one.
Educational content, not investment advice. zengtrade is paper-first and non-custodial.