Your first solve, step by step
How to Solve a Rubik's Cube — Beginner Method
A standard 3×3 Rubik's cube has six faces, each a different colour, made of centre, edge and corner pieces. The centres never move relative to one another, so each centre defines the final colour of its face — they are your fixed reference points. Solving the cube means getting every edge and corner home around those centres.
This guide uses the beginner layer-by-layer (LBL) method: you build the cube one layer at a time — first layer, middle layer, then the yellow top — using a small set of short, memorable algorithms. It starts with the daisy, the friendly warm-up almost every modern tutorial uses before the white cross. Every step lives on its own page with a 3D demonstration; work through them in order.
A quick word on notation
Algorithms are written with single letters for each face: R (right), L (left), U (up), D (down), F (front) and B (back). A plain letter means turn that face 90° clockwise; a letter followed by an apostrophe (like R′) means counter-clockwise; and a letter with a 2 means a half (180°) turn.
If any of this feels unfamiliar, read the full move-notation primer first — it takes two minutes and makes every algorithm readable.
One motion, four of the eight steps
Four moves — R U R′ U′ — carry steps 3, 4, 5 and 8. Cubers call a short set like that a trigger, because you fire the whole thing or none of it. You meet it properly in step 3, but it has a drill of its own: a solved cube, nothing to get wrong, and six sets that always bring the cube back to where it started.
The eight steps
Hold the cube with the yellow centre on top to begin — you'll build the white layer on the bottom, then the middle layer, and finish with the yellow top. Each step opens on its own page:
The Daisy
Bring the four white edges up next to the yellow middle. They look like petals, and they set up the white cross.
White Cross
Drop each petal straight down to build the white cross. Every edge has to line up with the middle of the same colour.
First-Layer Corners
Drop the four white corners into place with one short set of moves, and the first layer is done.
Second-Layer Edges
Send the four middle edges down into their slots. One set of moves does the right-hand ones, and its mirror does the left.
Yellow Cross
Turn the top edges yellow side up: dot, then L, then line, then cross. One short set of moves does all of it.
Yellow Edges
Move the top edges round until each one matches the middle below it. One set of moves, called Sune, does the work.
Yellow Corners — Position
Move each yellow corner to the slot it belongs in. Twisted is fine for now, because twisting is the last step.
Yellow Corners — Orient
Twist each yellow corner until it faces up. Run one short set over and over, and the cube is solved.