Caleb Valenzuela
Legend
I think it would be nice to reflect on the past a little and compare what has (and hasn’t) improved since the old gen days of cubing. For a little bit of clarification, I’m referring to 2000-2018 as “old gen” and 2019-present day as “new gen”.
I’ll be dividing this into multiple sections so that it’s easier to read.
Speedsolving/Records/WCA
Obviously, all the WCA events have improved, but the WRs are gradually slowing down as a result. Compared to pre-covid speedcubing, which had records in a range of events being broken atleast every few months, WRs now are happening less frequently. The jumps in times aren’t that huge either. 2026 seems to be the exception though, since we’ve gotten more than 10 world records in the span of 5 months! A lot of mental barriers are probably going to be broken this year as well, since we’ve already seen TWO 3x3 WRs, a couple of big cube WRs, the first ever sub-30 5x5 single, and many more CRs. From what i’ve seen, 2026, in a way, feels like old gen cubing, with records coming out left and right.
But then, of course, there’s a negative aspect to all of this, and it’s that new gen cubing might be more… dramatic (in italics for dramatic effect). I will admit that drama has always been present, and always will be in no matter what community you’re in, but compared to old gen drama (occasional cheating, usually punished immediately with minimal discussion), new gen drama is a bit more intense. I noticed this in 2024 during what i call the “Sliding Incident”. We all know sliding, and a lot of us differ in reaction. The WCA tried to make things right, but it received some backlash. But all of it ended well, or so we thought. Because Yiheng continued to slide even after being penalized, up until today. It triggered a lot people that the WCA isn’t doing much about it, aside from a penalty or two. I personally think the WCA should take stricter measures for sliding, since it can be the difference from just another top result to a WR. In 2025, the WCA made a controversial decision to move Antoni Stojek to 3rd place in the Clock event at the WCA World Championship 2025, after a 1-move miss-scramble. And now, in 2026, there’s been drama between the two “little giants”, aka Yiheng and Xuanyi. But in reality, it’s really just the parents of two competitors arguing. I don’t think the WCA has had this much drama in the span of 3 years, since I remember watching A LOT of videos from the old gen, and it usually was a one-sided discussion, with a clear conclusion. But take my opinion on the old gen with a grain of salt, because i’m a new gen (lol).
Hardware/Methods
Hardware has improved A LOT since the 2010s. The most notable innovations in my opinion were:
Piece-to-piece magnets
Dual adjustment systems
Adjustable magnets
which are all old gen stuff. Anti-corner twisting design and the invention of torpedos were also important. Hardware innovation mainly happened from during the old gen era. In the new generation, i feel like puzzle innovation has decreased a lot. For the past 4(?) years we’ve been pretty much repeating the same old design for 3x3. Sometimes they’ll add or remove already-existing features, but aside from that there’s nothing new. The last “great” innovations from the new generation were corner-core magnets and maglev. Some could say edge-core magnets were a big thing too, but it wasn’t as impactful on the cubing community from my observations.
Speedcubing methods haven’t changed all too much either. CFOP, Roux, and ZZ are still the big three from the old gen to the new gen. But there’s been a lot more talk from a LL method that originated from Petrus (you could say it was a “banished” member from the big three), and that’s ZB. For many years people thought ZB was impractical due to the amount of algs it has, together with recog and algs. But then in 2020 or so, someone by the name of Tymon decided to take it a step further, and went on and learned ZB (well, iirc it was only until 2024 when he actually learned everything). This pushed ZB into the spotlight, caused a debate between CFOP and ZB (which is funny because i remember people calling ZB and sub-set of CFOP), and inspired the new and the old generations to start learning ZB. Now, a bunch of sub-10 year-olds are learning ZB, which is when some people decided to call themselves, “cooked”. There’s also been a few other methods that have been created in the new gen, namely, APB, CEOR, and some other ones that i forgot. All of these methods though are very similar to eachother. CEOR is like APB but with CP, and APB is like Petrus. What a coincidence! I’m a big fan of APB, and i believe that with enough recognition, it can rival CFOP.
Cubing Community
The first thing that I saw when i joined cubing was how warm and welcoming it was. A lot of people were supportive of me. And i don’t think any of that changed. Sure, there’s some drama now, but 99% of the community is still the same as we knew it in 2015, 2020, 2024, and so on. I really admire how people can cheer each other on and be kind, even if they don’t know eachother all that well. One thing that i notice that did change was the age of cubers. There are A LOT of kids now. Many of the cubers that are top WR20 in 3x3 are kids. The world record holder is literally a 9-year-old
. Compared to back then (referring to the old gen), where there were more older cubers like Feliks, Mats Valk, Lucas Etter, Max Park, and many other names.
summary
here’s a breakdown of what i think changed over the years (in simpler terms)
Speedcubing:
Old Gen: obviously slower than the New Gen, but had many more records on average. There was less controversy as well.
New Gen: Faster records, but less frequent than the Old Gen. There’s more controversy now than before. I don’t know if it’s a sign that the WCA needs to “lock in” or if that’s a sign of growth (or both)
Hardware:
Old Gen: More innovations, worse performance compared to newer cubes overall
New Gen: Less innovations, better performance compared to older cubes
note: this is for 3x3
Methods:
Old Gen and New gen: not much has changed aside from new methods and old methods suddenly becoming relevant.
The cubing community: Nothing has changed in terms of the atmosphere, but in terms of the age of cubers, there’s a big shift.
Please share your thoughts and correct me if i’m wrong about some things. I would like to hear what old gen cubing was actually like from a casual cuber standpoint
I’ll be dividing this into multiple sections so that it’s easier to read.
Speedsolving/Records/WCA
Obviously, all the WCA events have improved, but the WRs are gradually slowing down as a result. Compared to pre-covid speedcubing, which had records in a range of events being broken atleast every few months, WRs now are happening less frequently. The jumps in times aren’t that huge either. 2026 seems to be the exception though, since we’ve gotten more than 10 world records in the span of 5 months! A lot of mental barriers are probably going to be broken this year as well, since we’ve already seen TWO 3x3 WRs, a couple of big cube WRs, the first ever sub-30 5x5 single, and many more CRs. From what i’ve seen, 2026, in a way, feels like old gen cubing, with records coming out left and right.
But then, of course, there’s a negative aspect to all of this, and it’s that new gen cubing might be more… dramatic (in italics for dramatic effect). I will admit that drama has always been present, and always will be in no matter what community you’re in, but compared to old gen drama (occasional cheating, usually punished immediately with minimal discussion), new gen drama is a bit more intense. I noticed this in 2024 during what i call the “Sliding Incident”. We all know sliding, and a lot of us differ in reaction. The WCA tried to make things right, but it received some backlash. But all of it ended well, or so we thought. Because Yiheng continued to slide even after being penalized, up until today. It triggered a lot people that the WCA isn’t doing much about it, aside from a penalty or two. I personally think the WCA should take stricter measures for sliding, since it can be the difference from just another top result to a WR. In 2025, the WCA made a controversial decision to move Antoni Stojek to 3rd place in the Clock event at the WCA World Championship 2025, after a 1-move miss-scramble. And now, in 2026, there’s been drama between the two “little giants”, aka Yiheng and Xuanyi. But in reality, it’s really just the parents of two competitors arguing. I don’t think the WCA has had this much drama in the span of 3 years, since I remember watching A LOT of videos from the old gen, and it usually was a one-sided discussion, with a clear conclusion. But take my opinion on the old gen with a grain of salt, because i’m a new gen (lol).
Hardware/Methods
Hardware has improved A LOT since the 2010s. The most notable innovations in my opinion were:
Piece-to-piece magnets
Dual adjustment systems
Adjustable magnets
which are all old gen stuff. Anti-corner twisting design and the invention of torpedos were also important. Hardware innovation mainly happened from during the old gen era. In the new generation, i feel like puzzle innovation has decreased a lot. For the past 4(?) years we’ve been pretty much repeating the same old design for 3x3. Sometimes they’ll add or remove already-existing features, but aside from that there’s nothing new. The last “great” innovations from the new generation were corner-core magnets and maglev. Some could say edge-core magnets were a big thing too, but it wasn’t as impactful on the cubing community from my observations.
Speedcubing methods haven’t changed all too much either. CFOP, Roux, and ZZ are still the big three from the old gen to the new gen. But there’s been a lot more talk from a LL method that originated from Petrus (you could say it was a “banished” member from the big three), and that’s ZB. For many years people thought ZB was impractical due to the amount of algs it has, together with recog and algs. But then in 2020 or so, someone by the name of Tymon decided to take it a step further, and went on and learned ZB (well, iirc it was only until 2024 when he actually learned everything). This pushed ZB into the spotlight, caused a debate between CFOP and ZB (which is funny because i remember people calling ZB and sub-set of CFOP), and inspired the new and the old generations to start learning ZB. Now, a bunch of sub-10 year-olds are learning ZB, which is when some people decided to call themselves, “cooked”. There’s also been a few other methods that have been created in the new gen, namely, APB, CEOR, and some other ones that i forgot. All of these methods though are very similar to eachother. CEOR is like APB but with CP, and APB is like Petrus. What a coincidence! I’m a big fan of APB, and i believe that with enough recognition, it can rival CFOP.
Cubing Community
The first thing that I saw when i joined cubing was how warm and welcoming it was. A lot of people were supportive of me. And i don’t think any of that changed. Sure, there’s some drama now, but 99% of the community is still the same as we knew it in 2015, 2020, 2024, and so on. I really admire how people can cheer each other on and be kind, even if they don’t know eachother all that well. One thing that i notice that did change was the age of cubers. There are A LOT of kids now. Many of the cubers that are top WR20 in 3x3 are kids. The world record holder is literally a 9-year-old
. Compared to back then (referring to the old gen), where there were more older cubers like Feliks, Mats Valk, Lucas Etter, Max Park, and many other names.summary
here’s a breakdown of what i think changed over the years (in simpler terms)
Speedcubing:
Old Gen: obviously slower than the New Gen, but had many more records on average. There was less controversy as well.
New Gen: Faster records, but less frequent than the Old Gen. There’s more controversy now than before. I don’t know if it’s a sign that the WCA needs to “lock in” or if that’s a sign of growth (or both)
Hardware:
Old Gen: More innovations, worse performance compared to newer cubes overall
New Gen: Less innovations, better performance compared to older cubes
note: this is for 3x3
Methods:
Old Gen and New gen: not much has changed aside from new methods and old methods suddenly becoming relevant.
The cubing community: Nothing has changed in terms of the atmosphere, but in terms of the age of cubers, there’s a big shift.
Please share your thoughts and correct me if i’m wrong about some things. I would like to hear what old gen cubing was actually like from a casual cuber standpoint
maybe the megaminx is jus the rubiks cube 2.0 and we just gotta make more attention for it
