The Rubik’s WCA World Championship is less than a month away. If you’re going, then it’s safe to say that you can expect the most entertaining Rubik’s Cube competition ever. It’s also likely that at least a few world records will be broken. However, if you won’t be able to make the flight to Incheon, Republic of Korea, then there is still a lot of entertainment to be had. This article covers the top competitors going into this comp and also where to watch or stream this competition live.
Where to Watch
Worlds 2023 will most likely be live-streamed through a multitude of channels. You can expect to be able to watch it through the Youtube channel CubersLive which live streams a lot of comps in Western California and is likely going to do the same for Worlds. Many popular Youcubers like Cubehead, Tingman, and Phillip Lewicki from LaZer0MonKey will also likely be vlogging the event.
3×3, OH, and FMC
Ah yes, 3×3, everyone’s favorite event. Until recently, most people were either banking on Max Park or Tymon Kolasiński, but now, 9-year-old Yiheng Wang has posed a threat to both of them. Averaging around 0.4 seconds faster than both of them, Yiheng is the top pick for Worlds 2023, but due to their competitive nature as cubers, don’t expect anything less from Max and Tymon.
3×3 OH is either going to Max or Patrick, who has recently surpassed Max as the OH average WR holder, a title that Max is looking to take back as soon as he gets a chance.
FMC is a pretty random event but it’s likely to be Jayden McNeil who has also broken the average WR recently with a mean of 21.00
4×4 – 7×7
Even though it’s the World Championships, 4×4, 5×5, 6×6, and 7×7 are pretty much locked because Max Park is the undisputed champion of these events. He holds the single and average world records for all of these events by a large margin. It’s safe to say that he will be winning these events at worlds. However, there is some notable competition this year round such as Seung Hyuk Nahm in 5×5 and of course, Tymon Kolasiński who is just a few seconds behind Max in 5×5 and 6×6. 7×7 however, is guaranteed to go to Max because second place for this event is over 11 seconds behind Max’s 1:42.12 average.
Max is over 11 seconds faster than the second fastest 7×7 competitor, Seung Hyuk Nahm
Based on his previous performance in big comps, it’s also safe to say that Max will be breaking at least one world record in this category of puzzles because he has a prominent history of doing so over and over again and with the amount of rounds and events, a WR is even more likely to happen.
| 4×4, 5×5, 6×6, 7×7 |
| 1. Max Park |
| 2. Seung Hyuk Nahm |
| 3. Tymon Kolasiński |
2×2
Since 2×2 is quite a luck-based event, it makes sense that there are multiple people who have a good chance of winning the title of 2×2 world champion. However, it is likely that Zayn Khanani will be our champion since he got the world record average of 1.01 a few months back. There is another contender though, you may have heard of him, Yiheng Wang. Yup, the 9-year-old 3×3 prodigy is also great at 2×2. Who would have guessed that 3×3 lookahead and efficiency translate over to 2×2. With his 1.13 AsR average, it is possible that Yiheng takes the title from Zayn very soon.
| 2×2 |
| 1. Zayn Khanani |
| 2. Alexey Tsvetkov |
| 3. Yiheng Wang |
Skewb, Pyraminx, Megaminx
Zayn Khanani is over 0.2 seconds ahead of second place
Skewb and Mega are both pretty pre-decided events. The skewb title is likely to go to Zayn Khanani who has been dominating the competition lately with multiple sub-1.8 averages in comp.
Leandro Martìn Lòpez has been dominating Megaminx
For megaminx, Leandro Martín López is my top pick. He has broken his own average and single world record over 3 times in the past year and is continuing to improve very rapidly. Although there are some notable competitors in megaminx like Tristan Chua Yong, and Nicolas Naing, based on his consistency and improvement over the past year, Leandro still has the best chance of winning the title.
Pyraminx is a very close event with many skilled competitors
Pyraminx is similar to 2×2 in the sense that it’s very luck based which means that many people have a chance to win. Furthermore, it is not dominated by one single competitor which means that it is difficult to predict the victor. Michael Nielsen and Elyas Eyou are definitely the top 2 choices because not only are they both top 10 in the world for average, but they have been competing recently and are actively improving as opposed to some of the other top rankers whose PRs are from multiple years ago. But don’t forget about Tymon and Elijah Brown, both of whom average very close to the world record and have been competing recently with astounding results.
Square-1
Square-1 is going to be a battle between Max Siauw and Sameer Aggarwal, both averaging within 0.1 seconds of each other. Hassan Khanani has also been improving rapidly and may improve quite a lot before this comp comes around. After getting the Square-1 single WR, Ryan Pilat was also a top prospect but unfortunately, he won’t be attending the 2023 World Champs.
| Square-1 |
| 1. Max Siauw |
| 2. Sameer Aggarwal |
Clock
For some reason, not many prominent clock solvers like Jacob Chambers and Yunhao Lou are attending worlds, this means that for clock, the only people who average sub-4 are Tommy Cherry, and Caleb Trelford, so subsequently, they are the most likely to podium, and based on Tommy Cherry’s recent clock stats, it is likely that we will see him become the world champion.
3BLD, 4BLD, 5BLD, and mBLD
Because of his skill in the blindfolded events, Tommy Cherry is likely to win the 3BLD event and maybe even get a sub-14 average.
Stanley Chapel is highly likely to win 4BLD, but he has good competition from Hill Pong Yong Feng in 5BLD as they both have been trading world records over the past year and have PR singles within 0.05 seconds of each other. This amount of competition is quite unusual for 5BLD as it used to be dominated by Stanley.
The two top 5BLD’ers have singles within 0.05 of each other!
In multi-blind, Graham Siggins is my top pick because of his world record of 62/65 which has stood for over a year with no one even coming close.
So those were my predictions for Worlds 2023. Let me know if you have some ideas or think someone else may take the title. If you enjoyed this article, consider liking this post and subscribing to my blog as it really helps me out. Thanks!
All of the screenshots of rankings were taken from the WCA World Championship 2023 page which can be found on the worldcubeassociation.com website.
Cubing Content 
Leave a comment