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2026-08-14
Video
Selling Weekly Puts as an Income Program 💵

Selling a weekly put is getting paid to wait. Collect premium, take on an obligation, and if the trade works, do it again next week. What turns that into an income program is a handful of rules applied consistently every week.

🎥 Watch our YouTube video for the full plan.

Here are the main topics we cover in the video:
  • Set a realistic target: around 10-20% annualized yield on the capital you put to work, not 1% every week forever
  • Sizing against the collateral: a $100 strike can park up to $10,000 of buying power until the trade closes
  • When to sit out: low implied volatility, a confirmed downtrend, or a macro event inside your expiration window
  • The scan and the exit rules: filters that build a shortlist in under a minute, plus the three exit rules written before entry
2026-07-16
Video
Butterflies, Placed Where They Actually Pay Off 🦋

Most traders place butterflies at the money, hoping the stock freezes at one price by expiration. But sideways action is rare. Shift the butterfly out of the money and it becomes a cheap, defined-risk way to bet on direction, above the market for bullish, below for bearish.

🎥 Watch our YouTube video to see how out-of-the-money call and put butterflies work, the Broken Wing version that can delete risk on one side, and how to trade the real payoff curve.

📰 Prefer reading? Check out the blog post on directional butterflies
📊 All users can also use a predefined butterfly scan to find setups instantly.
2026-06-22
New Version
Option Samurai Q2 2026 Update: Research Hub, Sort by Sector & Faster Servers

Markets had plenty to digest this quarter, from a new Federal Reserve chair to geopolitical tension feeding into energy prices and inflation. When the macro picture gets noisy, the edge comes from doing your homework on each name, and that's what this release is about. In this version, we focused on giving you a dedicated place to analyze any stock before you trade it.

Here's what we've added in this version:
  • Research, a new hub to analyze any stock or ETF, with price history, fundamentals, implied volatility, and options activity in one place. And all of this has been created from an options trader's point of view!
  • Sort the sector filter alphabetically (A to Z or Z to A), with an Industry filter coming next
  • Faster servers and an improved data engine for quicker scans and better uptime
  • General bug fixes and improvements
Read more about the version (which is live) on our blog post.

2026-05-23
Blog
Bargain or Falling Knife Ticker? Use Research to Find Out 🔍


When a stock drops hard, the question is always the same: is it a bargain or a falling knife? And if there's a trade, should you buy directional exposure or sell premium into the fear? The Research page puts everything you need on a single ticker page to answer that in minutes.

Here's what the walkthrough covers:
  • How to read the price chart, fundamentals, and scores for a quick stock-level read
  • Using IV Rank and IV vs HV to see whether options are cheap or expensive
  • Checking open interest and put-call ratios for positioning context
  • Seeing which Option Samurai scans the stock currently matches
  • Going from analysis to a specific trade idea without leaving the page
We published a full use-case article walking through the process on Nike ($NKE):
📖 Read the article
The video runs through the same sequence on a different ticker:
▶️ Watch the video

Or skip both and open the Research page on a stock you're already watching.
2026-05-07
New Feature
Research is Here: Your Options Trading Workstation 🔬


We're excited to introduce Research, a dedicated hub for analyzing any stock or ETF before you place a trade. While the Screener helps you scan the entire market to find opportunities, Research lets you go deeper on a single ticker. Instead of jumping between tools or external websites, everything you need to evaluate a position is now in one place.

Here's what's inside Research:
  • Stock Header: See the company's most important data at a glance
  • Price Chart: A unique feature that allows you to analyze the company's past performance and what the option market says about the future.
  • Company Profile: Business summary, key data (Market Cap, Float, Avg Volume, 52-week range, Next Earnings), and management info
  • Financial Metrics: Revenue, earnings, margins, and more
  • Options Analytics: A plain-language options market snapshot: IV Rank, IV vs HV, open interest and volume split by puts and calls, all with contextual labels
  • Relevant Scans: See which of your saved scans this ticker is currently triggering, in real time
  • Implied Volatility Analysis: IV Rank, IV-HV spread, skew analysis, and time-series charts to assess whether options are expensive or cheap
  • Find a Trade: Run a custom scenario, your saved scans, or predefined scans filtered to this specific stock.
Each ticker has its own URL, so you can bookmark your favorite stocks and return to them instantly.

👉 Try Research now on AAPL, and use the search bar to jump to any ticker.
For a full walkthrough of every section, check out our Knowledge Base article.

Research is currently in Beta. We are building more tools, so stay tuned!
2026-04-13
Blog
Low-Risk Options Trading: Credit Spreads & Collars 🛡️

Low-risk options trading comes down to two things: a max loss you know before you enter, and odds that favor you rather than the other side of the trade. We shared a video walkthrough covering three strategies that do exactly that: bull put spreads, bear call spreads, and collars.

Here's what we covered:
  • Bull put spread: a credit trade that profits when the stock goes up, stays flat, or even drops a bit
  • Bear call spread: the mirror image of the strategy above. This strategy gives you room to be slightly wrong about your bearish thesis.
  • Collar: downside protection on stock you already own. We explained why selling the call OTM (not ATM) makes all the difference
  • How to evaluate each setup's breakevens, risk/reward, and when to reach for each one

In our video on the topic, we walk through each strategy with real examples:
▶️ Watch the video
2026-03-21
New Version
Option Samurai Q1 2026 Update - Trade Charts, Mobile UX & Free Options Cheat Sheet


The beginning of 2026 has already brought significant geopolitical developments that are influencing market behavior. Through changing conditions, we continue to release updates every quarter, with a focus on improving the tools you rely on. In this version, we focused on giving you more control over trade analysis, a smoother experience across devices, and better educational resources to support your trading.

Here's what we've added in this version:
  • Advanced trade chart controls to explore P&L across price, IV, and DTE scenarios
  • Resizable table columns across the screener
  • Major mobile experience improvements for trading on the go
  • Rebuilt blog with new widgets and improved content structure
  • Free options cheat sheet covering 15 strategies, Greeks, and market conditions
  • General bug fixes and improvements
Read more about the version (which is live) on our blog post.
2026-03-16
Blog
Options Cheat Sheet
We've just published a cheat sheet aimed at beginners to help them get started and use during their trading. This free options strategies cheat sheet covering 15 key strategies (from long calls to iron condors) plus the Greeks explained with examples. Use this option strategy cheat sheet as your go-to quick reference before every trade.



2026-02-23
Blog
Plan Your Wheel Strategy Several Moves Ahead

The Wheel Strategy is one of the most popular option strategies, but the traders who get the most out of it plan several moves ahead before entering the first trade. We shared a video walkthrough showing how to evaluate and set up each leg of the Wheel with confidence.

Here's what we covered:
  • How to evaluate a stock before selling the put (using dividend yield, P/E at the strike price, and long-term hold comfort)
  • How to plan your covered call leg before assignment even happens
  • An advanced variation (the covered straddle) that can boost yield on stocks you're bullish on
  • How Option Samurai's built-in scans, filters, and benchmarks support each step
In our video on the topic, we break down how to plan your Wheel Strategy from start to finish:

2026-01-22
Blog
Covered Calls Aren’t Just a 100-Share Strategy.

Last year, we launched our Custom Strategy Scanner. It’s a unique feature that lets you scan the entire market for option strategies built around your exact assumptions.

In this update, we focus on how that flexibility applies to the classic covered call. By adjusting the number of shares behind the call, whether fewer or more than 100, you can change the risk profile, capital usage, and how the trade behaves under different market scenarios.

Here’s what we included in this update: 
  • A practical breakdown of covered calls with fewer or more than 100 shares
  • A comparison of how these variations behave across different market scenarios
  • Key trade-offs between capital efficiency, downside risk, and upside participation
  • How to find and build these setups using the Custom Strategy Scanner

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