Best Low-Float Scanners in 2026, and Which 'Float' Each One Uses

Every low-float scanner will filter for "float under 10 million". Very few say which float they mean, and on the small caps where that filter matters most, the definitions can be a quarter or more apart.

Four different numbers get called "float":

1. Shares outstanding, sometimes shown where a float should be.
2. Non-affiliate float, the SEC figure: shares outstanding minus shares held by affiliates. Restricted shares held by non-affiliates are still in it.
3. Tradeable float: non-affiliate float minus restricted or unregistered blocks that cannot legally reach the tape yet.
4. Vendor free float: each data provider's own method, refreshed on its own schedule.

Below are eight scanners in alphabetical order, with what each charges as of 2026-10-12, what it is good for, and the float definition it documents on its own site. If the concept is new, read Float vs shares outstanding first.

Gulf Resources (GURE) makes the point well, because every input sits in two recent filings.

The arithmetic, step by step:

• Shares outstanding. The 10-Q filed 2026-09-30 states 1,813,531 shares outstanding as of September 29, 2026, excluding treasury stock.
• Affiliates. The proxy filed 2026-10-02 lists the officers and directors as a group at 138,736 shares, and two named holders at 82,495 and 198,568 shares (the second at 11.0%). Signal8 treats all three as affiliate-held: 138,736 + 82,495 + 198,568 = 419,799.
• Non-affiliate float. 1,813,531 − 419,799 = 1,393,732.
• Tradeable float. The company issued 274,000 shares in four private placements agreed between January and March 2026. Nothing in the filings Signal8 read showed those shares registered for resale, so its convention deducts them: 1,393,732 − 274,000 = 1,119,732.
• Vendor float. Until 2026-10-05, Signal8 showed a vendor figure of 1,165,733 beside a share count of 1,539,531. That count is the December 31, 2025 figure, from before the private placements, so the vendor number sat on a share base about 274,000 shares smaller than today's.

So the answers run from 1.12 million to 1.81 million, about 62% apart measured from the smallest. A "float under 1.5 million" filter keeps this stock on three of the four numbers and drops it on the fourth. None of them is a typo. Each answers a different question.

Some tickers have no defensible point float at all. VivoPower (VIVO) is one, as of 2026-10-12.

The company last stated a non-affiliate share count in its F-3/A of 2024-03-22: 3,270,599 shares outstanding, 1,936,696 of them held by non-affiliates. On 2026-08-21 it reported 31,993,555 Class A shares outstanding. A week later it reported a direct subscription of more than $9 million of shares at $4.20 under Regulation S, without the exact share count and without saying whether those shares are inside the August 21 figure.

Signal8 therefore shows the float as ≥ 1,936,696, a floor with low confidence, and withholds a point figure. It also declined to fall back to an older computed float, since that figure predates two unsized issuances. A scanner printing one number for this ticker is either using a figure from before those issuances or estimating. Neither has to be wrong, but without a label you can't tell which.

We checked every competitor fact below on the vendor's own site on 2026-10-12. "Not documented" means we found no definition on their site that day, not that the tool has none. Prices are as of 2026-10-12 and move often.

Look at what each one subtracts. Finviz takes out every holder above 5%. Benzinga and Scanz take out institutional holdings. Trade Ideas, Warrior and Finviz name restricted or Rule 144 shares explicitly; TradingView's definition never mentions restricted shares. StocksToTrade leans on the SEC-reported figure, which is the non-affiliate number. On a stock like GURE those choices produce three different answers.

• Scanning depth and alerting. Trade Ideas lists 500+ alert and filter data points, AI signals and backtesting. Signal8's scanner filters on price, change, relative volume, float, market cap, short interest, halts, catalysts and, for Pro, dilution and cash runway. If you run dozens of custom alert windows, Trade Ideas and Scanz Pro go further.
• Free tier limits. Free Signal8 accounts get the built-in presets only. Custom filters and screen alerts need Pro.
• Charting. TradingView's charts are in a different league, and Day Trade Dash charts are built on TradingView.
• Coverage of the filing-derived float. The filing-derived tradeable float exists only where Signal8 has a dilution snapshot. Other tickers get a fallback figure, labelled as one, and some get a bound or nothing. Another scanner may print a number where Signal8 shows "≥" or "not measured".
• Community. Benzinga Pro Essential, Warrior and StocksToTrade sell trading rooms and education alongside their tools. Signal8 does not sell a trading room.

You don't need a scanner to settle a disputed float, just two filings: the latest 10-Q or 10-K cover page for shares outstanding and its as-of date, and the latest proxy (DEF 14A) or prospectus ownership table for officers, directors and large holders.

Subtract the affiliates and you have the non-affiliate float. Then look for unregistered issuances since that date: private placements, Regulation S sales, shares issued in acquisitions, and lockups. Take out the ones not yet registered or free to sell, and what remains is a tradeable float. If shares have been issued since the last stated count, the honest answer is a range. For how float feeds short-interest ratios, see Short interest and borrow; for volume context on low-float names, see Premarket RVOL.