The Rubik’s Cube is perhaps one of the most universally recognizable objects in the modern world. It’s the world’s best-selling toy ever, having sold more than 500 million units. It’s appeared on The Simpsons , in two Spider-Man films, and in Disney’s animated hit WALL-E . It’s been immortalized in The Museum of Modern Art and turned into a Google Doodle. And it just got its first major redesign in more than 50 years.
The new 3×3 cube has gotten a top-to-bottom makeover, from the strength of its internal springs to the shapes of its tiles and the texture of its surface. As part of the product launch, the Rubik’s team has also invested in a redesigned webpage that includes an illustrated, eight-step guide to solving the cube, a quiz to help players find the “solve style” that works best for them, and a series of YouTube videos produced in-house that explain each style.
[Photo: Courtesy Spin Master Ltd.]
Rubik’s (a brand that encompasses the iconic 3×3 cube as well as several other tactile puzzles ) was acquired by the toy company Spin Master in 2021. Since then, Spin Master has been on a mission to modernize Rubik’s products and introduce them to new audiences.
In a moment when retro tech is making a comeback and parents are looking for creative ways to entertain their kids without screens , Spin Master wants to position Rubik’s as the analog brand that makes problem-solving skills fun.
Ernö Rubik [Photo: Courtesy Spin Master Ltd.]
The world’s most famous toy
Ernö Rubik never set out to create a toy. The Hungarian architect and design professor was instead trying to invent a 3D object that had movement on all axes. It was the mid-’70s, and Rubik wanted a fun task to give to his students at the Budapest College of Applied Arts. After making his first prototype out of wood, Rubik realized that he had created something special. When he added colors to the sides of the object and gave it a spin, it became clear that he’d stumbled on a puzzle.
The original cube. [Photo: Courtesy Spin Master Ltd.]
“It actually took him about a month to solve his first Rubik’s Cube,” says George Scholey, an associate brand manager at Spin Master and holder of multiple Rubik’s Cube-related world records (including most cubes solved while running a marathon). “That’s completely fair enough, by the way, because if you were to try and work out a Rubik’s Cube on your own for your first-ever solve, it isn’t that easy.”
In fact, Scholey says, the Rubik’s Cube can be arranged into more than 43 quintillon different formations—essentially, an infinite number of possibilities. Every time the toy is scrambled, there’s a strong possibility that the user is seeing a completely unique cube. The puzzle’s unbelievable variety, paired with its simple form, is perhaps what catapulted the Rubik’s Cube to international fame.
“The fundamentals of the Rubik’s Cube can teach you so much—it’s not just about a party trick,” Scholey says. “This is about learning how to solve something, learning how to push through something. I think it’s really powerful.”
[Photo: Courtesy Spin Master Ltd.]
Rubik launched the cube as a product in Hungary before expanding it worldwide. By the mid-’80s, it was a hit. It’s difficult to overstate the pop cultural oeuvre and staying power of the Rubik’s Cube. Multiple current artists use it as their sole medium. In 2022, the hashtag #rubikscube had 4.1 billion views on TikTok . As recently as this June, the cube made an appearance in the Disney film Toy Story 5 .
While the design of the classic 3×3 cube has been tweaked several times over the years, it’s never been rebuilt wholesale. The Spin Master team knew that they wanted to reimagine the cube’s design to bring it to new audiences—but they had to do it without compromising any of the design’s most recognizable features.
[Photo: Courtesy Spin Master Ltd.]
How the Rubik’s Cube got a glow-up
The biggest change in the new Rubik’s Cube is the way it feels. Karen Harel, the design lead at Spin Master, says the main goal of the redesign was to improve the tactile experience for a modern audience of users that’s been familiarized with a wide breadth of fidget toys (we’re looking at you, fidget spinner ).
Solving the modern Rubik’s cube needed to feel easy, smooth, repeatable, and satisfying. And while the mechanism of the original toy has been beloved for decades, it has some significant shortcomings in those respects. Because of the original design’s sharp corners and compact form, every spin of the sides produces a lot of friction, meaning that the movement can feel labored and the cube’s pieces need to be in perfect alignment before they can be spun again. On the inside of the toy, tightly coiled springs make the whole construction extra rigid.
So, Harel’s team started by rethinking the cube’s basic construction. On the inside of the cube, they worked with manufacturers to test a variety of different spring strengths, landing on an iteration with a coil that lets the cube flex a bit without coming apart. Then, they reimagined the shape of each piece of the cube, rounding out their edges so that only the very outer pieces retain their sharp corners. For speed cubers like Scholey, they also mattified the exterior tiles, to prevent light glare and give the fingertips a bit more grip.
[Photo: Courtesy Spin Master Ltd.]
With the new springs and reduced tile-on-tile friction, the cube spins much more freely, even when its sides are out of alignment. It’s a fun fidget toy for those who don’t even want to solve the puzzle.
Scholey says the redesigned 3×3 cube serves as an entry point for customers to reengage with the Rubik’s brand. Since Spin Master acquired Rubik’s, it’s expanded the cube’s core principle to a multiplayer game called Rubik’s Rush and the board game Rubik’s Race. An upcoming partnership with Minecraft will aim to introduce Gen Alpha to the Rubik’s experience.
“This, to me, is the epitome of Rubik’s—the movement toward becoming not just a 3×3 cube brand, but the most culturally relevant problem-solving brand that exists,” Scholey says. “Just as Lego is to building, Rubik’s is to solving.”
