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About CubingHQ
CubingHQ exists because practising at your desk and competing on a stage are not the same activity, and almost nothing online helps you bridge the gap.
The problem it was built for
Nearly every speedcuber has had the same experience. You average 14 seconds at home. You sit down at your first competition, a judge you have never met starts the inspection countdown, the timer is a Stackmat instead of a keyboard, someone is watching, and you post 19, 22, 17, DNF, 18.
Nothing about your cube changed. What changed was everything around it: the inspection being enforced rather than approximate, five attempts that all count instead of a rolling average you can quietly restart, a room full of noise, and the knowledge that this one is real.
That gap is trainable, but only if you can practise the conditions rather than just the solves. That is what CubingHQ is for.
What it does
Competition simulator
Pick a real upcoming WCA competition, or configure a round yourself. CubingHQ pulls the actual event list and round format from the WCA, generates competition-legal scrambles, enforces the 15-second inspection with the 8- and 12-second calls, runs a proper scorecard, and computes your result under WCA rules — including how a DNF wrecks a mean but only trims an average of five. It runs venue ambience underneath, and it does not let you restart a bad attempt.
Timer
A fast, keyboard-driven timer in the csTimer tradition, with sessions, statistics, scramble previews, and support for Bluetooth smart cubes including a move-by-move breakdown of where your time actually went. Available inside the app or standalone at the timer page.
Algorithms and drills
A browsable algorithm database covering the standard 3x3 sets and more, with a trainer that drills a chosen subset case by case and times your recognition. Learning an algorithm and being able to execute it under pressure are different skills; the trainer targets the second.
Records and competitions
Current world and continental records, and a browser for upcoming WCA competitions so you can find the one you are training for. Both read from the WCA's public API.
Battle
Head-to-head rooms where several cubers solve the same scramble at the same time and watch the results land live. It is the closest thing to competitive pressure you can get without leaving the house.
Who builds it
One person. CubingHQ is a personal project by a cuber from Portugal, built because the tool was wanted and did not exist, and kept running because other people started using it. It is not a company, has no team, and has never taken funding.
That has consequences worth being upfront about: fixes arrive when there is time to make them, and the roadmap is whatever seems most useful next. It also means that if you email about a bug, the person who wrote the bug is the person who reads the email.
How it stays free
CubingHQ is free and always will be. Hosting and the domain are paid for with advertising. There is no subscription, no paid tier, no account to create, and nothing behind a paywall. We do not sell data — see the Privacy Policy for exactly what that means in practice.
What it is not
CubingHQ is an unofficial fan project. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by the World Cube Association. Simulated rounds are practice and carry no official standing whatsoever. For official competitions, results and rankings, go to the WCA.
Standing on other people's work
Very little here is built from nothing:
- The WCA publishes an open API, which is why competition and ranking data can be shown at all.
- cubing.js does the scrambling and the 3D puzzle rendering. Random-state scrambling is genuinely hard, and we did not solve it.
- SpeedCubeDB is the reference for the algorithm sets.
- csTimer set the conventions for what a cubing timer should feel like. The timer here follows them deliberately.
Where to start
If you have never competed, read what actually happens at a WCA competition. If you have competed and it went badly, read why your solves fall apart under pressure. Everything else is in the guides.
Get in touch
Bugs, corrections, feature requests, or a note that something is wrong in a guide — all welcome at martimcubing@gmail.com or via the contact page.