--- title: Lego Brickumentary: Number of Lego Brick Combinations description: This is how many LEGO brick combinations there are according to a math professor canonical: https://time.com/3977789/lego-brickumentary-math-professor-combinations/ author: Olivia B. Waxman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-07-31T13:45:27.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:43:44.601Z og:title: Here's How Many Ways You Can Combine 6 LEGO Bricks og:description: The number will astound you og:url: https://time.com/3977789/lego-brickumentary-math-professor-combinations/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Here's How Many Ways You Can Combine 6 LEGO Bricks twitter:description: The number will astound you twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # The Number of Ways You Can Put Together 6 LEGO Bricks Will Astound You ## Video: The Best of Stephen Colbert [Watch (HLS stream): The Best of Stephen Colbert](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/PNJDP9f3.m3u8) (4:30)  _Published 2014-04-10. The next host of_  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Jul 31, 2015 1:45 PM UTC  by [Olivia B. Waxman](https://time.com/author/olivia-b-waxman/)  ## Olivia B. Waxman Staff Writer Jul 31, 2015 1:45 PM UTC With the Danish documentary on LEGO, _A_ _LEGO Brickumentary,_ premiering in U.S. theaters, iTunes, and OnDemand Friday, the gaming news website [_Kotaku_ posted a clip](http://kotaku.com/calculating-lego-brick-combinations-is-ridiculously-tou-1720682129) from the film profiling the math professor who became famous for calculating that there are 915,103,765 ways to combine six, eight-stud LEGO bricks. Inspired by a LEGOLAND display that seemed to lowball the number at 103 million, Søren Eilers from the University of Copenhagen created a computer program that now drums up that figure in 5 minutes. Why was LEGO’s estimate off? Eilers says it’s because it only counted the ways bricks could be stacked on top of each other in tower formations, not accounting how low, wide structures can be put together. To figure out how many ways seven bricks can be combined, it took Eilers two hours. Eight bricks? Nearly 21 days (20.83 to be exact). Nine? Ten? That would take years, hundreds of years, he says, so something to think about if you have some free time this summer. ### See Celebrities and Their Lego Figures  Chris Pratt: Owen Grady Universal; Lego  Chris Pratt: Star Lord Disney/Marvel; Lego  Zoe Saldana: Gamora Disney/Marvel; Lego  Dave Bautista: Drax Disney/Marvel; Lego  Robert Downey Jr.: Iron Man Disney/Marvel; Lego  Chris Evans: Captain America Disney/Marvel; Lego  Chris Hemsworth: Thor Disney/Marvel; Lego  Scarlett Johansson: Black Widow Disney/Marvel; Lego  Jeremy Renner: Hawkeye Disney/Marvel; Lego  Mark Ruffalo: Hulk Disney/Marvel; Lego  Paul Bettany: Vision Disney/Marvel; Lego  Elizabeth Olsen: Scarlet Witch Disney/Marvel; Lego  Aaron Taylor-Johnson: Quicksilver Disney/Marvel; Lego  Cobie Smulders: Agent Maria Hill Disney/Marvel; Lego  Tom Hiddleston: Loki Disney/Marvel; Lego  Samuel L. Jackson: Nick Fury Disney/Marvel; Lego  Samuel L. Jackson: Mace Windu Lucasfilm/Disney; Lego  Mark Hamill: Luke Skywalker Lucasfilm/Disney; Lego  Harrison Ford: Han Solo Lucasfilm/Disney; Lego  Harrison Ford: Indiana Jones Paramount; Lego  Carrie Fisher: Leia Organa Lucasfilm/Disney; Lego  Billy Dee Williams: Lando Calrissian Lucasfilm/Disney; Lego  Christopher Lee: Count Dooku Lucasfilm/Disney; Lego  Christopher Lee: Saruman New Line Cinema; Lego  Sir Ian Mckellen: Gandalf the Grey New Line Cinema; Lego  Elijah Wood: Frodo Baggins New Line Cinema; Lego  Sean Astin: Samwise Gamgee New Line Cinema; Lego  Viggo Mortensen: Aragorn New Line Cinema; Lego  Orlando Bloom: Legolas New Line Cinema; Lego  John Rhys-Davies: Gimli New Line Cinema; Lego  Hugo Weaving: Elrond New Line Cinema; Lego  Daniel Radcliffe: Harry Potter Warner Bros.; Lego  Emma Watson: Hermione Granger Warner Bros.; Lego  Rupert Grint: Ron Weasley Warner Bros.; Lego  Alan Rickman: Professor Snape Warner Bros.; Lego  Helena Bonham Carter: Bellatrix Lestrange Warner Bros.; Lego ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3977789/lego-brickumentary-math-professor-combinations/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3977789/lego-brickumentary-math-professor-combinations/"},"headline":"The Number of Ways You Can Put Together 6 LEGO Bricks Will Astound You","datePublished":"2015-07-31T13:45:27.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:43:44.601Z","description":"The math professor who created this computer program appears in the documentary A Lego Brickumentary, out July 31","url":"https://time.com/3977789/lego-brickumentary-math-professor-combinations/","keywords":["Newsfeed","society"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Olivia B. 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