7 · Orienting the yellow corners

The goal: the complete yellow face — and a fully solved cube.

Last step. The corners are in the right spots, all that is left is to twist them in place. You already know the algorithm: it is the one from step 2.

R' D' R D

Repeat 2 or 4 times on one corner, until its yellow sticker arrives on top.

The absolute rule

NEVER turn the whole cube during this step

It is the one way to destroy everything three moves from the end.

To move from one corner to the next, you turn only the top face with U. The cube itself stays still in your hands: the corner you are working on is always top right, in front of you.

The corner is already in the right spot: the sequence only twists it on itself.

The procedure

1. Bring an unsolved corner to the top right, in front of you, with U.
2. Do R' D' R D until its yellow is on top (2 or 4 times).
3. With U and nothing else, bring the next unsolved corner to that same spot.
4. Go back to point 2.

When the last corner is oriented, the top layer falls back into place by itself on the final U. The cube is solved.

The scary moment

Between the second and third corner, the cube looks completely destroyed: the bottom is broken, the colours are all over the place.

Half way through step 7, the cube looks like this. Nothing is broken: as long as you only did U moves between repetitions, it all falls back into place.

That is normal, and it is the point where most people give up thinking they
made a mistake. **Keep going.** As long as you only did `U` moves between
repetitions, everything falls back into place at the end. Trust yourself.

And now

You can solve a Rubik's Cube. Do it three or four more times following these pages, then try without looking — you will find you remember more than you think.

After that, two directions:

• Consolidate: Getting faster explains how to get under two minutes without learning a single extra algorithm.
• Progress: Moving on to CFOP is the method used in competition. Its first step, F2L, halves your time on its own.