Rubik's Snake
A twistable chain of 24 prisms forming countless shapes.
The Rubik's Snake (also Rubik's Twist, Rubik's Transformable Snake, Rubik's Snake Puzzle) is a toy consisting of 24 wedges that are right isosceles triangular prisms, connected by spring bolts so they can be twisted but not separated. Invented by Ernő Rubik, better known as the inventor of the Rubik's Cube, the snake was released during 1981 at the height of the Rubik's Cube craze. By being twisted, it can be made to resemble a wide variety of objects, animals, or geometric shapes; its "ball" shape in its packaging is a non-uniform concave rhombicuboctahedron.
- Inventor
- Ernő Rubik
- Year released
- 1981
- Type
- Mechanical puzzle / toy
- Number of pieces
- 24 wedges
- Maximum possible shapes
- at most 70 trillion (≈7×10^13)
- Actual possible shapes
- about 13 trillion (1.3×10^13) without collisions
Lore & Background
Ernő Rubik, already famous for the Rubik's Cube, invented the Rubik's Snake as a separate puzzle. According to Rubik, "The snake is not a problem to be solved; it offers infinite possibilities of combination. It is a tool to test out ideas of shape in space." He noted that while theoretically the number of combinations is limited, practically it is limitless, and a lifetime is not sufficient to realize all its possibilities. Other manufacturers have produced versions with more pieces than the original 24.
Reader's Guide
The Rubik's Snake holds significance as a simple yet deeply combinatorial mechanical puzzle that emerged during the peak of the Rubik's Cube craze. Unlike the cube, which has a defined solved state, the snake is open-ended, described by its inventor as a tool for testing ideas of shape in space. Its legacy includes inspiring variations with more pieces and a dedicated notation system for replicating shapes. The puzzle's mathematical interest lies in the vast number of possible configurations—over 13 trillion non-colliding positions—making it a subject of combinatorial enumeration. A world record for the fastest time to solve a snake into a ball was set by Lim Kai Yi on 7 January 2024, completing it in 2.19 seconds. The snake remains a classic example of a nonplanar flexagon-like toy and is often referenced in discussions of mechanical puzzles.
Did You Know?
- Its 'ball' shape in packaging is a non-uniform concave rhombicuboctahedron.
- The maximum number of different shapes is at most 4^23, or about 70 trillion.
- Peter Aylett computed that about 13 trillion positions are possible without prism collisions.
More in Hungarian inventions 1-24
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