Rubik's Cube Benefits: What Science Says, What Is Myth

Quick summary

Research 1: 30 days of cube practice and processing speed

In 2024, Sanjay Singh, Kamaljeet Sandhu and Lokesh published research in the International Journal of Indian Psychology with 30 schoolchildren aged 11 to 13 in Agra, India (IJIP).

The children practised solving the 3x3 with the 7-step layer-by-layer method, one hour a day, six days a week, for 30 days. Before and after the practice period, they took two processing speed tests (Digit Symbol and Symbol Search, from the Wechsler intelligence tests). Their scores after the practice were clearly higher in statistical terms.

Read this result with care:

• There was no control group. There was no group of children who did not practise the cube to compare against. Part of the rise may simply come from the children already knowing the test the second time.
• The sample was small. 30 children, at one school picked because it was convenient.
• It measured one narrow thing. Processing speed is not IQ, and it is not a maths score either.

The fair conclusion: regular cube practice may go along with processing information faster, but it would take larger research with a control group to say so for sure.

Research 2: who gets the hang of the cube faster?

In 2023, E. J. Meinz, D. Z. Hambrick and colleagues published research in the Journal of Intelligence with 79 university students who had never solved a Rubik's Cube (Europe PMC).

Each person had one session of up to 6 hours, watching a video guide to the 7-step beginner method and then practising on their own. The results were quite surprising:

• 87% got through step 1, but only about 1% reached step 7 within those 6 hours.
• People with higher reasoning scores (fluid intelligence) got further and solved more accurately.
• Working memory, grit and growth mindset hardly predicted who would get further at all.

The key point: this research measured ability before people started on the cube, so it does not tell us whether solving the cube changes intelligence. It only shows who picks it up faster in the first session.

For beginners, there are two practical takeaways. First, if you still cannot solve the whole cube after a few hours, that is true for almost everyone, not a sign that you are bad at it. Second, splitting your practice into several short sessions is easier than one long one.

Research 3: what does a fast solver's brain do?

In 2025, A. A. Zarei, A. S. Oliveira and colleagues published research in Experimental Brain Research that measured the brain waves (EEG) of 13 experienced fast cube solvers, while they looked over the cube to plan and while they solved it (Europe PMC).

They found that brain activity while planning and while solving was quite similar, and that some brain wave bands were linked to scores on spatial and planning tests. This research describes the brains of people who are already good, and it does not prove that cube practice changes the brain. The sample was also very small: 13 people, all male.

Myth: does solving the cube raise your IQ?

None of the research we found shows that solving a Rubik's Cube raises your IQ. Research 2 shows that only the opposite direction has data behind it: people who reason well pick up the cube faster. These two ideas are very easy to mix up. "People who are good at the cube are often smart" does not mean "solving the cube makes you smarter".

In the same way, claims like "the cube makes you good at maths" or "the cube fights dementia" appear on many shop pages, but with no research attached. When you read an advert about the benefits of the Rubik's Cube, ask: which research, how many people, and was there a control group?

So what does the cube really do for you?

The points below are what EasyRubic has noticed from helping beginners, not research results. We say so clearly so you can judge for yourself.

• Practising patience and breaking a problem into pieces. The beginner method splits the cube into 7 steps. Each step is a small goal with a picture to compare against. The first step is the white cross:

• The feeling of doing something hard. Solving the whole cube for the first time is a very clear milestone. The solved cube looks like the picture on the right in the last step:

• A hobby with no screen. You can carry a Rubik's Cube anywhere and enjoy it alone or with friends.
• A community and competitions. The World Cube Association (WCA) runs competitions in many countries, open to all ages. See Rubik's Cube competitions with the WCA.

Try it now: a sequence that undoes itself

Here is a fun way to see that the Rubik's Cube follows patterns. Starting from a solved cube, do the pair of moves R2 U2: turn the right face half a turn, then the top face half a turn. The cube gets a little scrambled.

1. You start with (input)
3. After the formula

Do that exact pair of moves 6 times in a row, and the cube goes back to how it was. The picture above shows the last round: on the left is the cube after 5 rounds, on the right after the 6th. The pieces the moves shift are coloured in, and the rest are grey. If your cube does not come back, you turned something wrong along the way: do it again more slowly and count out loud.

Not sure what R, U and the 2 mean yet? Read Rubik's Cube notation for beginners first.

How to start so it really pays off

1. Follow the 7-step method in How to solve a Rubik's Cube 3x3 for beginners, one step at a time.
2. Practise in short, regular sessions. 15 to 20 minutes a day is easier to keep up than one long session at the weekend, and it saves you the "6 hours and still not done" feeling from research 2.
3. Keep track of your progress. The first day you finish the cross, the first day you solve the whole cube, your best solve time. Seeing yourself improve is the biggest motivation there is.

Video

Prefer to see it in motion? The short video below from the Minh-Oz Vlog channel on YouTube adds more pictures to this post. The video belongs to that channel and is embedded straight from YouTube.

Sources

• Effect of Cognitive Training on Processing Speed of School Going Children: An Intervention Study with 3X3 Rubik Cube, Sanjay Singh, Kamaljeet Sandhu, Lokesh, International Journal of Indian Psychology, 2024.
• Ability and Nonability Predictors of Real-World Skill Acquisition: The Case of Rubik's Cube Solving, E. J. Meinz, D. Z. Hambrick, J. J. Leach, P. J. Boschulte, Journal of Intelligence, 2023.
• The electrocortical activity of elite Rubik's cube athletes while solving the cube, A. A. Zarei, C. R. Frederiksen, M. B. Jensen, A. S. Oliveira, Experimental Brain Research, 2025.