Free Rubik's Cube Solver — 3×3 and 2×2, step by step
Paint your Rubik's Cube's colors and get a step-by-step solution for a 3×3 or 2×2, with a 3D preview of every move. Free, instant, runs in your browser.
Pick a color, then tap a sticker to paint it. The preview turns to the face you are painting.
About the Rubik's Cube solver tool
A Rubik's Cube has more than 43 quintillion possible arrangements, yet every one of them can be solved in 20 turns or fewer. This solver does the searching for you: paint the colors you see on your own cube and it returns an ordered list of turns that takes that exact arrangement back to six solid faces. It handles the classic 3×3 and the pocket 2×2.
The answer comes from Kociemba's two-phase algorithm, the method behind most computer solvers. It first brings the cube into a smaller set of positions that can be finished with only quarter turns of the top and bottom and half turns of the other faces, and finishes from there. It does not hunt for the single shortest solution, which is a far slower search, but it never needs more than 21 turns — close to the proven limit of 20 — and it answers almost instantly.
Everything runs in your browser: the colors you paint are not uploaded, and the solver itself is only downloaded when you press the button. A 2×2 has no fixed centers, so its colors are read off the corners. Because a 2×2 is solved by treating it as a 3×3 whose edges are already in place, its solution can use noticeably more turns than the shortest possible one.
How it works
Choose and paint
Pick 3×3 or 2×2, then copy each face of your cube by choosing a color and tapping its stickers. Hold the cube with white on top and green facing you for the sides; tip it toward you for the top face and away from you for the bottom face.
Find the solution
Press Find my solution. The cube is checked first — a wrong sticker count or an impossible piece is reported so you can fix it — and then the turns are worked out in your browser.
Turn along
Make each move on your cube as it appears, always looking straight at the face you are turning. The 3D preview shows the cube after every move so you can compare it with yours.
Frequently asked questions
- How should I hold the cube while I enter the colors?
- For a 3×3, hold it with white on top and green facing you, then copy the front, right, back and left faces by turning the whole cube around a vertical axis. For the top face tip the cube toward you so white faces you with the back edge up; for the bottom face tip it away from you. The preview turns to the face you are painting to show the angle. It matters because every sticker has to sit in the right place relative to the centers.
- What if my cube has different colors or a different layout?
- A 3×3 is read by its centers, and the tool expects the standard layout: white opposite yellow, green opposite blue and red opposite orange, with red on the right when white is on top and green in front. Nearly every modern cube uses it. A 2×2 has no centers, so any colors work: the tool works out which color belongs to which face from the corners.
- Why does it say my cube is impossible?
- The tool refuses colors that could never occur on a real cube, because nothing can solve them. The usual causes are a wrong sticker count — every color appears exactly nine times on a 3×3 and four times on a 2×2 — a single twisted corner, a single flipped edge, or two pieces swapped. Recheck the faces the message points to. A cube that has been taken apart and put back together can really end up in such a state, and turning alone will never fix it.
- How many moves will the solution take?
- A 3×3 solution is never longer than 21 turns, a little above the proven best case of 20, because the solver chooses speed over the very shortest answer. The shortest possible 2×2 solution is never longer than 11 turns, but the one shown here may be somewhat longer for the reason described above.
- What do letters like R, U′ and F2 mean?
- Each letter is a face: U up, D down, L left, R right, F front and B back. A letter alone turns that face a quarter turn clockwise as you look straight at it, an apostrophe means counterclockwise, and a 2 means a half turn, which is the same in either direction.
- Is my cube sent anywhere?
- No. The colors you paint and the moves found stay in your browser tab; nothing about your cube is uploaded or saved.