How the speedcubing limit forecast works
/wca/prediction forecasts the physical and statistical limits of 16 WCA events using three parallel approaches: curve-fitting (exp+floor / Gompertz / power-law), first-principles physics floors (M/TPS+R), and extreme-value theory (GEV). Data span 1982-2050.
Three-track forecast methods
- Curve fitting (exp+floor / Gompertz / power-law) — fits converging curves to the historical WR sequence. exp+floor and Gompertz capture S-shaped deceleration; power-law fits the early rapid-drop phase. Forecasts are a weighted ensemble.
- Physics floor (M/TPS+R) — decomposes a solve into move count M, human TPS, and reaction time R, then derives the biomechanical hard floor. Per-event parameters come from published literature and sports-science data.
- Extreme-value theory (GEV) — treats annual WR progressions as an extremes sequence and fits a generalised extreme-value distribution. Yields probabilistic intervals for "century-scale" and "billion-participant" scenarios.
Report structure
1
Top Line
Shows how many events sit within 80% of their physics floor — less than 1.25× compression remaining — the global signal that speedcubing is hitting the wall.
2
Closest to Wall
16 events ranked by current WR / physics-floor ratio. Closer to 1.0 = closer to the limit. 3×3 BLD and 5×5 BLD typically top the list.
3
Per-event analysis
Per event: historical WR line + three fitted curves + physics floor; per-move TPS/step biomechanical decomposition; milestone forecasts for 2030/2040/2050; regional distribution map.
Data source
Data comes from a local WCA MySQL dump processed by a Python fitting script, producing stats/prediction/all_events.json. Regenerated manually after major WR progressions. Not guaranteed real-time — the page shows the data generation date.
See also
- 3×3 deep-dive — deeper per-section analysis for 3×3.
- Distribution — per-cuber result distribution KDE visualisation.
- All Results — browse historical WR progressions per event.