Optimal solutions for Rubik's Cube

Optimal solutions for Rubik's Cube refer to solutions that are the shortest.
There are two common ways to measure the length of a solution. The first is to
count the number of quarter turns. The second is to count the number of outer-
layer twists, called "face turns". A move to turn an outer layer two quarter
(90°) turns in the same direction would be counted as two moves in the quarter
turn metric (QTM), but as one turn in the face metric (FTM, or HTM "Half
Turn Metric", or OBTM "Outer Block Turn Metric").[1]

The minimal number of face turns needed to solve any instance of the Rubik's
A scrambled Rubik's
Cube is 20,[2] and the minimal number of quarter turns is 26.[3] These
Cube
numbers are also the diameters of the corresponding Cayley graphs of the
Rubik's Cube group. In STM (slice turn metric), the minimal number of turns
is unknown.

There are many algorithms to solve scrambled Rubik's Cubes. An algorithm that solves a cube in the
minimum number of moves is known as God's algorithm.

Contents
Move notation
Lower bounds
Upper bounds
Thistlethwaite's algorithm
Kociemba's algorithm
Korf's algorithm
Further improvements, and finding God's Number
References
Further reading
External links

Move notation
To denote a sequence of moves on the 3×3×3 Rubik's Cube, this article uses "Singmaster notation",[4]
which was developed by David Singmaster.

The letters L, R, F, B, U, and D indicate a clockwise quarter turn of the left, right, front, back, up, and
down face respectively. Half turns are indicated by appending a 2. A counterclockwise quarter turn is
indicated by appending a prime symbol ( ′ ).

The letters M, S and E are used to denote the turning of a middle layer. M represents turning the layer
between the R and L faces 1 quarter turn top to bottom. S represents turning the layer between the F and B
faces 1 quarter turn clockwise, as seen from the front. E represents turning the layer between the U and D
faces 1 quarter turn clockwise left to right. As with regular turns, a 2 signifies a double turn and a prime (')
indicates a quarter turn anticlockwise.[5]

The letters X, Y and Z are used to signify cube rotations. X signifies rotating the cube in the R direction. Y
signifies the rotation of the cube in the U direction. Z signifies the rotation of the cube on the F direction .
These cube rotations are used in algorithms to make the algorithms smoother and faster. As with regular
turns, a 2 signifies a half rotation and a prime (') indicates a quarter rotation in the opposite direction. Note
that these letters are usually lowercase instead.

Lower bounds
It can be proven by counting arguments that there exist positions needing at least 18 moves to solve. To
show this, first count the number of cube positions that exist in total, then count the number of positions
achievable using at most 17 moves starting from a solved cube. It turns out that the latter number is smaller.

This argument was not improved upon for many years. Also, it is not a constructive proof: it does not
exhibit a concrete position that needs this many moves. It was conjectured that the so-called superflip
would be a position that is very difficult. A Rubik's Cube is in the superflip pattern when each corner piece
is in the correct position, but each edge piece is incorrectly oriented.[6] In 1992, a solution for the superflip
with 20 face turns was found by Dik T. Winter, of which the minimality was shown in 1995 by Michael
Reid, providing a new lower bound for the diameter of the cube group. Also in 1995, a solution for
superflip in 24 quarter turns was found by Michael Reid, with its minimality proven by Jerry Bryan.[6] In
1998, a new position requiring more than 24 quarter turns to solve was found. The position, which was
called a 'superflip composed with four spot' needs 26 quarter turns.[7]

Upper bounds
The first upper bounds were based on the 'human' algorithms. By combining the worst-case scenarios for
each part of these algorithms, the typical upper bound was found to be around 100.

Perhaps the first concrete value for an upper bound was the 277 moves mentioned by David Singmaster in
early 1979. He simply counted the maximum number of moves required by his cube-solving
algorithm.[8][9] Later, Singmaster reported that Elwyn Berlekamp, John Conway, and Richard K. Guy had
come up with a different algorithm that took at most 160 moves.[8][10] Soon after, Conway’s Cambridge
Cubists reported that the cube could be restored in at most 94 moves.[8][11]

Thistlethwaite's algorithm

The breakthrough, known as "descent through nested sub-groups" was found by Morwen Thistlethwaite;
details of Thistlethwaite's algorithm were published in Scientific American in 1981 by Douglas Hofstadter.
The approaches to the cube that led to algorithms with very few moves are based on group theory and on
extensive computer searches. Thistlethwaite's idea was to divide the problem into subproblems. Where
algorithms up to that point divided the problem by looking at the parts of the cube that should remain fixed,
he divided it by restricting the type of moves that could be executed. In particular he divided the cube group
into the following chain of subgroups:
Next he prepared tables for each of the right coset spaces . For each element he found a
sequence of moves that took it to the next smaller group. After these preparations he worked as follows. A
random cube is in the general cube group . Next he found this element in the right coset space .
He applied the corresponding process to the cube. This took it to a cube in . Next he looked up a
process that takes the cube to , next to and finally to .

Intermediate state of the Rubik's Cube in Kociemba's algorithm. Any state from G1 will
have the "+" and "–" symbols as shown.[12]

Although the whole cube group is very large (~4.3×1019 ), the right coset spaces
and are much smaller.
The coset space is the largest and
contains only 1082565 elements. The number of moves required by this algorithm is the sum of the largest
process in each step.

Initially, Thistlethwaite showed that any configuration could be solved in at most 85 moves. In January
1980 he improved his strategy to yield a maximum of 80 moves. Later that same year, he reduced the
number to 63, and then again to 52.[8] By exhaustively searching the coset spaces it was later found that the
worst possible number of moves for each stage was 7, 10, 13, and 15 giving a total of 45 moves at
most.[13] There have been implementations of Thistlewaite's algorithm in various computer languages.[14]

Kociemba's algorithm

Thistlethwaite's algorithm was improved by Herbert Kociemba in 1992. He reduced the number of
intermediate groups to only two:
As with Thistlethwaite's algorithm, he would search through the right coset space to take the cube
to group . Next he searched the optimal solution for group . The searches in and were
both done with a method equivalent to IDA*. The search in needs at most 12 moves and the
search in at most 18 moves, as Michael Reid showed in 1995. By also generating suboptimal solutions
that take the cube to group and looking for short solutions in , much shorter overall solutions are
usually obtained. Using this algorithm solutions are typically found of fewer than 21 moves, though there is
no proof that it will always do so.

In 1995 Michael Reid proved that using these two groups every position can be solved in at most 29 face
turns, or in 42 quarter turns. This result was improved by Silviu Radu in 2005 to 40.

At first glance, this algorithm appears to be practically inefficient: if contains 18 possible moves (each
move, its prime, and its 180-degree rotation), that leaves (over 1 quadrillion) cube states to be
searched. Even with a heuristic-based computer algorithm like IDA*, which may narrow it down
considerably, searching through that many states is likely not practical. To solve this problem, Kociemba
devised a lookup table that provides an exact heuristic for .[15] When the exact number of moves
needed to reach is available, the search becomes virtually instantaneous: one need only generate 18
cube states for each of the 12 moves and choose the one with the lowest heuristic each time. This allows
the second heuristic, that for , to be less precise and still allow for a solution to be computed in
reasonable time on a modern computer.

Korf's algorithm

Using these group solutions combined with computer searches will generally quickly give very short
solutions. But these solutions do not always come with a guarantee of their minimality. To search
specifically for minimal solutions a new approach was needed.

In 1997 Richard Korf[16] announced an algorithm with which he had optimally solved random instances of
the cube. Of the ten random cubes he did, none required more than 18 face turns. The method he used is
called IDA* and is described in his paper "Finding Optimal Solutions to Rubik's Cube Using Pattern
Databases". Korf describes this method as follows

IDA* is a depth-first search that looks for increasingly longer solutions in a series of
iterations, using a lower-bound heuristic to prune branches once a lower bound on their
length exceeds the current iterations bound.

It works roughly as follows. First he identified a number of subproblems that are small enough to be solved
optimally. He used:

1. The cube restricted to only the corners, not looking at the edges
2. The cube restricted to only 6 edges, not looking at the corners nor at the other edges.
3. The cube restricted to the other 6 edges.

Clearly the number of moves required to solve any of these subproblems is a lower bound for the number
of moves needed to solve the entire cube.
Given a random cube C, it is solved as iterative deepening. First all cubes are generated that are the result of
applying 1 move to them. That is C * F, C * U, … Next, from this list, all cubes are generated that are the
result of applying two moves. Then three moves and so on. If at any point a cube is found that needs too
many moves based on the upper bounds to still be optimal it can be eliminated from the list.

Although this algorithm will always find optimal solutions, there is no worst case analysis. It is not known
how many moves this algorithm might need. An implementation of this algorithm can be found here.[17]

Further improvements, and finding God's Number

In 2006, Silviu Radu further improved his methods to prove that every position can be solved in at most 27
face turns or 35 quarter turns.[18] Daniel Kunkle and Gene Cooperman in 2007 used a supercomputer to
show that all unsolved cubes can be solved in no more than 26 moves (in face-turn metric). Instead of
attempting to solve each of the billions of variations explicitly, the computer was programmed to bring the
cube to one of 15,752 states, each of which could be solved within a few extra moves. All were proved
solvable in 29 moves, with most solvable in 26. Those that could not initially be solved in 26 moves were
then solved explicitly, and shown that they too could be solved in 26 moves.[19][20]

Tomas Rokicki reported in a 2008 computational proof that all unsolved cubes could be solved in 25 moves
or fewer.[21] This was later reduced to 23 moves.[22] In August 2008 Rokicki announced that he had a
proof for 22 moves.[23]

Finally, in 2010, Tomas Rokicki, Herbert Kociemba, Morley Davidson, and John Dethridge gave the final
computer-assisted proof that all cube positions could be solved with a maximum of 20 face turns.[2]
In
2009, Tomas Rokicki proved that 29 moves in the quarter-turn metric is enough to solve any scrambled
cube.[24] And in 2014, Tomas Rokicki and Morley Davidson proved that the maximum number of quarter-
turns needed to solve the cube is 26.[3]

The face-turn and quarter-turn metrics differ in the nature of their antipodes.[3]
An antipode is a scrambled
cube that is maximally far from solved, one that requires the maximum number of moves to solve. In the
half-turn metric with a maximum number of 20, there are hundreds of millions of such positions. In the
quarter-turn metric, only a single position (and its two rotations) is known that requires the maximum of 26
moves. Despite significant effort, no additional quarter-turn distance-26 positions have been found. Even at
distance 25, only two positions (and their rotations) are known to exist.[3] At distance 24, perhaps 150,000
positions exist.

References
1. "World Cube Association" (https://www.worldcubeassociation.org/regulations/#12a3).
www.worldcubeassociation.org. Retrieved 2017-02-20.
2. "God's Number is 20" (http://www.cube20.org/). cube20.org. Retrieved 2017-05-23.
3. "God's Number is 26 in the Quarter Turn Metric" (http://cube20.org/qtm/). cube20.org.
Retrieved 2017-02-20.
4. Joyner, David (2002). Adventures in group theory: Rubik's Cube, Merlin's machine, and
Other Mathematical Toys (https://archive.org/details/adventuresingrou0000joyn/page/7).
Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 7 (https://archive.org/details/adventuresingro
u0000joyn/page/7). ISBN 0-8018-6947-1.
5. "Rubik's Cube Notation" (https://ruwix.com/the-rubiks-cube/notation/). Ruwix. Retrieved
2017-03-19.
 6. Michael Reid's Rubik's Cube page M-symmetric positions (http://cflmath.com/~reid/Rubik/m_
symmetric.html)
7. Posted to Cube lovers on 2 Aug 1998 (http://cflmath.com/~reid/Rubik/Cubelovers/cube-mail-
25)
8. Rik van Grol (November 2010). "The Quest For God's Number" (https://web.archive.org/web/
20141109174500/http://digitaleditions.walsworthprintgroup.com/article/The_Quest_For_Go
d%E2%80%99s_Number/532775/50242/article.html). Math Horizons. Archived from the
original (http://digitaleditions.walsworthprintgroup.com/article/The_Quest_For_God%E2%8
0%99s_Number/532775/50242/article.html) on 2014-11-09. Retrieved 2013-07-26.
9. Singmaster 1981, p. 16.
10. Singmaster 1981, p. 26.
11. Singmaster 1981, p. 30.
12. Herbert Kociemba. "The Subgroup H and its cosets" (http://kociemba.org/math/20moves/sub
groupH.html). Retrieved 2013-07-28.
13. Progressive Improvements in Solving Algorithms (http://cubeman.org/dotcs.txt)
14. Implementation of Thistlewaite's Algorithm for Rubik's Cube Solution in Javascript (https://ru
bik-cube-solver.com/)
15. "Solve Rubik's Cube with Cube Explorer" (http://kociemba.org/cube.htm). kociemba.org.
Retrieved 2018-11-27.
16. Richard Korf (1997). "Finding Optimal Solutions to Rubik's Cube Using Pattern Databases"
(http://www-compsci.swan.ac.uk/~csphil/CS335/korfrubik.pdf) (PDF).
17. Michael Reid's Optimal Solver for Rubik's Cube (http://www.cflmath.com/~reid/Rubik/optimal
_solver.html) (requires a compiler such as gcc)
18. Rubik can be solved in 27f (http://forum.cubeman.org/?q=node/view/53)
19. Press Release on Proof that 26 Face Turns Suffice (http://www.neu.edu/nupr/news/0507/rubi
k.html)
20. Kunkle, D.; Cooperman, C. (2007). "Twenty-Six Moves Suffice for Rubik's Cube" (http://www.
ccs.neu.edu/home/gene/papers/rubik.pdf) (PDF). Proceedings of the International
Symposium on Symbolic and Algebraic Computation (ISSAC '07). ACM Press.
21. Tom Rokicki (2008). "Twenty-Five Moves Suffice for Rubik's Cube". arXiv:0803.3435 (https://
arxiv.org/abs/0803.3435) [cs.SC (https://arxiv.org/archive/cs.SC)].
22. Twenty-Three Moves Suffice (http://forum.cubeman.org/?q=node/view/117) — Domain of the
Cube Forum
23. twenty-two moves suffice (http://forum.cubeman.org/?q=node/view/121)
24. Tom Rokicki. "Twenty-Nine QTM Moves Suffice" (http://forum.cubeman.org/?q=node/view/14
3). Retrieved 2010-02-19.

Further reading
Singmaster, David (1981). Notes on Rubik's Magic Cube. Enslow Publishers.

External links
How to solve the Rubik's Cube, a Wikibooks article that gives an overview over several
algorithms that are simple enough to be memorizable by humans. However, such algorithms
will usually not give an optimal solution which only uses the minimum possible number of
moves.
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