Most speedcubing events rely heavily on algorithms to solve various cases efficiently. Some events even have hundreds and hundreds of algorithms just for one step of the solving process. While most of these algorithms are easy to learn and just require a lot of time, some are truly horrible and are known for their difficulty to both recognize and execute. Keep reading to find out what is the hardest cubing algorithm of all time.
This article was inspired by a video from Z3Cubing. I saw the idea and realized that I knew of some different difficult algorithms that weren’t mentioned in the video.
N-Perm
Although this 3×3 PLL is quite easy to recognize, the N-Perm (especially Nb) is notoriously difficult for its execution and finger tricks. The most common algorithm goes like this: R’ U R U’ R’ F’ U’ F R U R’ F R’ F’ R U’ R, and you can probably already see why it’s on this list. Aside from the fact that this is the longest PLL, this alg is especially bad because it uses R, U, and F moves in a way that is hard to finger trick efficiently. There is a newer version of this alg which is: r’ D’ F r U’ r’ F’ D r2 U r’ U’ r’ F r F’, and it’s slightly better but since it has a lot of wide moves, it’s quite risky in a speedsolve. Let me know in the comments what you think the best and worst PLLs are.
L2E Parity 5×5
What this alg would look like if you did it in the OLL stage
This last two edges case on 5×5 is sometimes called parity because it is the only parity-like swap that shows up in the entire solving process. This case shows up in 50% of solves and happens during the L2C stage of edge pairing. To solve this, you have to do a 5×5 version of OLL parity: Rw’ U2 3Rw U2 3Rw’ F2 Rw2 U2 Rw U2 Rw’ U2 F2 Rw2 F2 which is quite difficult and requires a lot of awkward moves like 3Rw. Luckily though, this is the only parity that shows up on 5×5. Since it is an odd-numbered cube, you don’t need to worry about parity later on. There are also a lot of other difficult L2E algs for 5×5 which are all listed on speedcubedb.com.
Square-1 Parity
Visualization from speedcubedb.com
This is perhaps the hardest alg in this list. As you may be beginning to see, most of the difficult algs in cubing usually deal with parity. This is because swapping or flipping one or two pieces in a small space requires a lot of moves and setup to be done. Sq-1 parity is no exception. Now technically, there are many parity cases for square 1 but the most notorious is undoubtedly the adjacent swap case which goes like this: /(-3,0)/(0,3)/(0,-3)/(0,3)/(2,0)/(0,2)/(-2,0)/(4,0)/(0,-2)/(0,2)/(-1,4)/(0,-3)/(0,3).
What makes this alg really hard is for one, the notation which is completely different from any other puzzle, and also the piece shape. Since square-1 consists of pieces of different shapes, it makes it even more difficult to do the alg while looking away from the cube since you don’t know if you’ve made a complete turn or not without looking down at the cube. If you’ve ever tried this alg before, then you have probably messed it up more than a few times.
If you enjoyed this article, feel free to subscribe for more content. Let me know in the comments if you know of some even more difficult algs that weren’t mentioned in this list, I would love to hear your thoughts!
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