Tick
In Uniswap V3, a tick is a discrete price point at which liquidity can be allocated. Prices are expressed as 1.0001^i where i is the tick index, giving a geometric spacing of 1 basis point per tick. Ticks define the boundaries of LP positions: when the price crosses a tick boundary, liquidity from positions with that boundary is either activated or deactivated. Tick spacing (e.g., 200 ticks for 30bp fee pools, 10 ticks for 5bp pools) determines the minimum range width of a position — smaller tick spacing allows more granular ranges but increases the gas cost of swaps because the contract must traverse more ticks. The tick-based architecture makes the liquidity distribution a discretized histogram, with each tick tracking the net liquidity added or removed at that price level. This data structure enables efficient on-chain price discovery and swap execution.