How to solve a 3×3 cube

A 3×3 cube is solved when each of its six faces is one colour. You turn one face at a time, and each turn moves the pieces around that face. A solve is a plan of turns that puts the pieces back without breaking what is already done.

Solve the cube

The pieces

• Centres: the middle square of each face. They never move relative to each other, so the centre tells you the colour its face will be.
• Edges: twelve pieces with two colours each.
• Corners: eight pieces with three colours each.

How moves are written

Each face has a letter: R (right), L (left), U (up), D (down), F (front) and B (back). A letter alone means a quarter turn of that face clockwise, as you look straight at it. A prime, R′, is the same turn anticlockwise. A 2, as in R2, is a half turn. M turns the middle slice between L and R. A sequence such as R U R′ U′ is read left to right, one turn at a time. Turning the whole cube in your hands is written x, y or z, and changes no pieces.

The game's first lessons teach these one at a time, on the cube on screen: faces and letters, the prime, twice, all six faces, reading a sequence, turning the whole cube, then slices and wide turns.

Layer by layer

The Layers method solves the cube from the white face down, in seven steps:

1. White cross: the four white edges around the white centre, each matching the centre beside it.
2. White corners: the four white corners, which finishes the first layer.
3. Middle layer: the four edges with neither white nor yellow, moved down into place.
4. Yellow cross: the four yellow edges facing up.
5. Yellow edges: those edges turned to match their side centres.
6. Yellow corners in place: each top corner in its own spot, even if twisted.
7. Yellow corners turned: each corner twisted until yellow faces up.

On this site's solver, a Layers solve averages 154 moves.

Faster methods

CFOP builds the cross, then pairs each white corner with its middle-layer edge and puts both in together, then finishes the top layer in four steps. It averages 71 moves here, and 56 with the top layer in two steps. Roux builds a 1×2×3 block on the left and another on the right, sets the top corners, then solves the last six edges with M and U turns. It averages 58 moves here, and 48 with the top corners in one step.

The coach

Pick a method and the coach shows the next few turns for the step you are on, checks each turn you make, and keeps its plan if you turn the wrong way and undo. Show me plays the next turns for you. Drag the cube to look at it from any side.

What to solve

Solve the daily scramble, the same for every player that day, or ask for a new one. To learn on a cube you own, paint it: hold it with the white centre on top and the green centre facing you, copy each face onto the screen, and the coach teaches you to solve that cube.