Solving Rubik's Cube

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About the Puzzle

Rubik's Cube was invented by Erno Rubik of Hungary in 1977. It was originally named the Magic Cube and it wasn't until it was sold in the West in 1980 by Ideal Toys that it got its more familiar name.

You can read more Rubik's Cube facts on the Rubik's Online web site so I won't bore you with more of that sort of trivia here.

The original puzzle is built around a very simple concept: subdivide a cube by slicing it into thirds along each axis. The result is 27 smaller cubes that can all rotate around the center. Since one cube is hidden in the center, only 26 cubes are visible. Colored stickers are attached to each of the 54 visible faces of the sub-cubes (some call them cubies) so that when correctly assembled, each face of the puzzle presents a single color. (The colors usually chosen are white, yellow, red, orange, blue and green.) Mix up the cube and the challenge becomes to return the cube to its original configuration where each of the faces on the cube presents a uniform color.

Many people have written very lengthy mathematical studies that prove the number of permutations in a Rubik's Cube. I'm not going to bore you with that. Suffice to say that it's something around a bazillion or so. It's certainly more than enough to make reassembling the little thing a maddening exercise for most mortals.

What I'm going to do here is provide some hints on how to go about solving the puzzle. I'll also go ahead and provide my solution although I recommend that you try and solve it on your own first. I'll also do the same for the 5x5x5 cube (also known as the Professor's Cube) and the 4x4x4 cube (also known as Rubik's Revenge). If all you want is hints, go to the sections just before the ones that give the solutions.

Incidentally, in case you're wondering, the 4x4x4 cube is actually harder than the 5x5x5 cube. That's why I've listed them in that order.

Also, you should know that these pages list my solutions. There are more than one solution. Whenever I find someone who has solved the cube on his or her own I find that they usually have created their own unique set of moves and methodologies for solving it. That's one of the beauties of the Rubik's Cube.

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