page_title: Rubik's Cube
section_title: Variations
hierarchical_section_title: Rubik's Cube / Variations
caption_attribution_description: English: A 17-layer version of Rubik's Cube made by YuXin
context_page_description: The Rubik's Cube is a 3-D combination puzzle invented in 1974 by Hungarian sculptor and professor of architecture Ernő Rubik. Originally called the Magic Cube, the puzzle was licensed by Rubik to be sold by Ideal Toy Corp. in 1980 via businessman Tibor Laczi and Seven Towns founder Tom Kremer. Rubik's Cube won the 1980 German Game of the Year special award for Best Puzzle. As of January 2009, 350 million cubes had been sold worldwide, making it the world's top-selling puzzle game. It is widely considered to be the world's best-selling toy.
  On the original classic Rubik's Cube, each of the six faces was covered by nine stickers, each of one of six solid colours: white, red, blue, orange, green, and yellow. Some later versions of the cube have been updated to use coloured plastic panels instead, which prevents peeling and fading. In currently sold models, white is opposite yellow, blue is opposite green, and orange is opposite red, and the red, white, and blue are arranged in that order in a clockwise arrangement. On early cubes, the position of the colours varied from cube to cube. An internal pivot mechanism enables each face to turn independently, thus mixing up the colours.
context_section_description: There are different variations of Rubik's Cubes with up to thirty-three layers: the 2×2×2 (Pocket/Mini Cube), the standard 3×3×3 cube, the 4×4×4 (Rubik's Revenge/Master Cube), and the 5×5×5 (Professor's Cube) being the most well known. As of 1981, the official Rubik's Brand has licensed twisty puzzle cubes only up to the 5×5×5. The 17×17×17 "Over The Top" cube (available late 2011) was until December 2017 the largest (and most expensive, costing more than two thousand dollars) commercially sold cube. A mass-produced 17×17×17 was later introduced by the Chinese manufacturer YuXin. A working design for a 22×22×22 cube exists and was demonstrated in January 2016, and a 33×33×33 in December 2017. Chinese manufacturer ShengShou has been producing cubes in all sizes from 2×2×2 to 15×15×15 (as of May 2020), and have also come out with a 17×17×17.
  Non-licensed physical cubes as large as 17×17×17 based on the V-Cube patents are commercially available to the mass-market; these represent about the limit of practicality for the purpose of "speed-solving" competitively (as the cubes become increasingly ungainly and solve-times increase quadratically).
  There are many variations of the original cube, some of which are made by Rubik. The mechanical products include Rubik's Magic, 360, and Twist. Also, electronics like Rubik's Revolution and Slide, were also inspired by the original.  One of the newest 3×3×3 Cube variants is Rubik's TouchCube. Sliding a finger across its faces causes its patterns of coloured lights to rotate the same way they would on a mechanical cube. The TouchCube also has buttons for hints and self-solving, and it includes a charging stand. The TouchCube was introduced at the American International Toy Fair in New York on 15 February 2009.
  The Cube has inspired an entire category of similar puzzles, commonly referred to as twisty puzzles, which includes the cubes of different sizes mentioned above as well as various other geometric shapes. Some such shapes include the tetrahedron (Pyraminx), the octahedron (Skewb Diamond), the dodecahedron (Megaminx), and the icosahedron (Dogic). There are also puzzles that change shape such as Rubik's Snake and the Square One.
  In 2011, Guinness World Records awarded the "largest order Rubiks magic cube" to a 17×17×17 cube, made by Oskar van Deventer. On 2 December 2017, Grégoire Pfennig announced that he had broken this record, with a 33×33×33 cube, and that his claim had been submitted to Guinness for verification. On 8 April 2018, Grégoire Pfennig announced another world record, the 2x2x50 cube. Whether this is a replacement for the 33x33x33 record, or an additional record, remains to be seen.
  Some puzzles have also been created in the shape of the Kepler-Poinsot polyhedra, such as Alexander's Star (a great dodecahedron). Grégoire Pfennig has also created at least one puzzle in the shape of a small stellated dodecahedron.
caption: A 17×17×17 cube
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