Learn to solve the Rubik's Cube and get under 20 seconds
First memorize the beginner method until you can solve the cube without looking anything up — a week or two. Then convert to CFOP, the method every world-record holder uses, and drill it on a real speedcube until you're consistently under 20 seconds. About 40 hours of practice spread over three months. You will not break a world record. You will solve the cube faster than anyone you know in person.
3 months · ~40 hours · consistent sub-20-second solve
1.J Perm — How To Solve The 3x3 Rubik's Cube
Do not start with CFOP. Learn the beginner layer-by-layer method first, from J Perm's free 3x3 guide. It uses a handful of short algorithms and gets you to a complete solve in 2–4 minutes within a few days. Solve it ten times a day until your hands know the moves without the page open. The beginner method teaches you to read the cube — the skill CFOP is built on top of. Skipping it is the single most common way people stall and quit.
Free
jperm.net/3x3 →2.A real speedcube — MoYu RS3 M V5
The cube that came in a toy aisle box turns like sandpaper and will cap your speed forever. Buy a proper magnetic speedcube. The MoYu RS3 M V5 is the standard budget pick — corner-cutting, magnetic alignment, tensionable — for under ten dollars, and it is genuinely competition-capable. Do not spend $35 on a flagship GAN as a beginner; the RS3 M removes every hardware excuse you have. Break it in for a day, then never look back.
~$9 (MoYu RS3 M V5, standard magnetic)
MoYu RS3 M V5 at SpeedCubeShop →3.J Perm — CFOP and the road to sub-20
Now convert to CFOP — Cross, F2L, OLL, PLL — using J Perm's tutorials. Learn intuitive F2L first; it's the biggest single time-save. Then 2-look OLL and 2-look PLL (about 16 algorithms) before you ever touch full OLL. Time every solve with a free timer like csTimer and track your average of five. Sub-30 comes from F2L alone; sub-20 comes from smooth lookahead and drilling your slow PLL cases. Practice cubing daily; speed is reps, not theory.
Free
jperm.net/3x3/cfop →If this doesn't fit you
If you only want to solve the cube once to say you can — no stopwatch, no second method — stop after step one. The J Perm beginner method is a complete, permanent solve on its own; you never need CFOP. Skip the speedcube too: any cube will get you a 2-minute solve. Speedcubing is a different hobby from solving, and there's no shame in only wanting the second one.
Why this path
The bottleneck for almost everyone is jumping straight to CFOP, drowning in 78 algorithms, and quitting before the first solve. The beginner method gives you a working solve and the cube-reading instincts that make F2L click later. Learning on a fast magnetic cube from day one of speed practice means your times reflect your skill, not your hardware. J Perm is the canonical teacher — clear, free, and the same source the competitive community sends beginners to. Method first, speed second. That order is the whole secret.