How to solve a pyraminx ? Ever wished you could solve a pyraminx easily and quickly? If yes, you’ll find this guide helpful.
Unlike what most people think, pyraminx is easier to solve than a Rubik’s cube. You can easily solve it in less than 12 moves, from any random position.
Below, we’ll take you through a quick, easy-peasy beginner-friendly guide on how to solve a pyraminx.
What’s a Pyraminx?
Before we get into details on how to solve this puzzle, let’s familiarize ourselves with the basics of this puzzle.
In the simplest terms, a pyraminx refers to a puzzle featuring a triangular shape and up to 4 faces with different colors.
As a beginner who has no prior experience solving this puzzle, you’d want to start by using letters (notations) to describe the rotation of your pyraminx.
If you can be able to read all the notations of your pyraminx, then you’ll have an easy time performing various algorithms involved in solving the puzzle. On a side note, we’ve also reviewed the best pyraminx on the market.
How to solve a Pyraminx: Pyraminx Notation
All the 4 corners of this puzzle are marked with letters. And each letter shows a 120 degree clockwise turn of the corner. To describe an anticlockwise turn of any corner, you simply add an apostrophe to the letter…for instance, R becomes R’.
In this guide, we’ll be using these letters to describe the tutorials for solving the puzzle.
Just like in the case of a Rubik’s cube, a pyraminx features different types of pieces, as noted by letters A, B, and C.
These include:
- Corner tips (A)
- Centers with up to 3 stickers (B)
- Edges with up to 2 stickers (C)
How to solve a pyraminx ?
Now that you understand the notations of your pyraminx puzzle, it’s time to get into details on how to solve it as a beginner.
This is how we do it:
(i). solve the tips and centers
To solve your pyraminx, you should start by turning its 4 corners (marked by letter A in the above diagram) to match the centerpieces.
Doing this involves making a simple turn for each corner since all the three sides of the center pieces (B) are linked together.
When your tips are okay, now it’s time to deep turn your puzzle to make the 3 center colors match on all the 4 pyraminx faces.
After you’ve successfully completed this step, your work becomes much easier as you just need to solve the 6 remaining edge pieces to achieve a full solution.
(ii). Solve 2 edges next to a corner
This step involves solving the 3 edges around the top corner. To do this, you simply use Right and Left algorithms we’ve outlined below, based on the insertion direction.
- Right algorithm: R F R’ F’
- Left algorithm: L’ F’ L F
NOTE: you’ll usually need an algorithm for the last piece only because you can solve the first 2 intuitively.
(iii). Solve the last layer edges
The final step involves permuting the last layer edges.
How to do that?
Well, you simply take the puzzle in your hands, making sure the scrambled face stays on the left, and then perform the needed turns—depending on your case.
Use these algorithms to solve your last layer edges:
- Clockwise cycle: U’ F U F’
- Counterclockwise cycle: U L’ U’ L
- Flip tow edges: F U’ F’ U F’ L F L’
How to solve a pyraminx: Wrap up
That’s how you solve a pyraminx from start to finish. As you can see, these steps are easy to follow and implement for absolute beginners.
If you already know to solve a Rubik’s cube, solving your pyraminx should be much easier.
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