About TwistyCube
What is this?
TwistyCube is a free, browser-based reimagining of the classic twisty puzzle. Instead of coloured stickers, the default mode uses numbers — solve by getting each face's digits in order, either sequentially or in a Sudoku-style layout. Colour mode plays like a traditional cube, and Word mode swaps the faces for Scrabble-style letter tiles, including a "set your own word" option.
It runs entirely in your browser as a 3D scene you can drag to turn and orbit — no download, no install, no account needed to play.
Sequential vs Sudoku
Both are win conditions you can toggle at the top of the page — they change what counts as "solved."
Sequential is the classic rule: every piece has to return to the exact spot and orientation it started in, just like solving a real Rubik's Cube. Nothing counts until the whole cube is back in its original state.
Sudoku is looser: a face counts as solved the moment it shows each digit 1–9 exactly once, in any position — pieces don't need to be back where they started, they just can't repeat a number on the same face. Sudoku mode only applies to the Number cube, since Colour and Word faces don't have nine distinct symbols for the rule to apply to.
How it's built
The cube is rendered with Three.js, driven directly rather than through a framework, which keeps the project dependency-light and the turning animation responsive. Each of the 26 visible pieces tracks its own position and rotation as the puzzle is turned, and every face texture — numbers, colours, or letter tiles — is drawn to a canvas at runtime rather than loaded as static images.
Moves work from both keyboard shortcuts and drag gestures: the drag direction is read from the motion across the cube's face to figure out which layer to turn and which way.
The optional leaderboard is powered by a small Cloudflare Worker backed by a D1 database. There are no accounts — a leaderboard entry is just a nickname, an optional social handle, and a score, validated on the server before it's stored.
Currently live
- Number, Colour and Word cube modes, switchable at any time
- Custom words in Word mode (checked against a dictionary, up to 6 letters)
- Sequential and Sudoku win conditions (Sudoku applies to Number mode only)
- Keyboard controls (U/D/L/R/F/B, Shift to reverse) and drag-to-turn
- A no-accounts leaderboard, filterable by mode
Get in touch
Found a bug, or have a suggestion? Email hello@twistycube.co.uk.