New fidget spinner world record set by Cambridge University engineering student

An engineering student from Cambridge University entered the record books by managing to spin a fidget spinner for the longest time with one finger.

James Goh, 23, built his own fidget spinner to achieve the Guinness World Records title in 30 minutes 34.54 seconds, beating the previous record by almost five minutes in the process.

He was at school in 2017 when popular children’s toys took the world by storm.

“This has been my hobby since I was a kid, so I’m really happy I got the record – although my finger was a little sore after holding it in the same position for so long,” he said.

“I guess I kind of saved the fidgeting from the fidgeting!”

Its record is about 20 times longer than a standard store-bought spinner.

The record-breaking attempt took place on December 16, 2025, in Hong Kong, where Mr Goh lives when not studying at Cambridge.

James said his fascination with gyroscopes began when he saw the spinning knob in Christopher Nolan’s 2010 science fiction film Inception.

As part of their degree, Cambridge engineering students are studying the physics of gyroscopes, critical components used in everything from smartphones to spacecraft navigation systems.

The Queens’ College student used what he learned, particularly in aerodynamics and tribology (the science of friction), to develop his hobby.

“People often ask me why I am so interested in spinning tops and fidget spinners,” he said.

“There is something absolutely hypnotic about them and their mechanical efficiency is quite remarkable.

“I also think it has a lot to do with being competitive; it’s a very interesting optimization problem because the goal is constantly changing.

“There are always new materials or techniques to fine-tune the design; there are always improvements that can be made.”

James, who is currently working on the Manufacturing Engineering Tripos, an option for the final two years of his Cambridge engineering degree, used academic papers to inform his experiments and help find the Guinness World Record-breaking formula.

He initially designed his own formula for spinning tops, but later used it to design the “pulsar wiggler” and set the new record.

“It requires collecting a lot of data to create the 3D models that I later prepared in the workshop,” he said.

“He helped me a lot in developing the formula for differential equations, although there is no real analytical solution as it is technically unsolvable.

“There is no magic, optimal spin time, but you can get close to it.”

The core of James’ spinner is made of lightweight, hollow aluminum, while tungsten, an extremely dense metal, is concentrated around the edges to store kinetic energy.

This means all the weight is outside, creating a “high moment of inertia” that helps it spin longer.

He said: “Designing a spinner is basically about three things: maximizing the energy you start with, minimizing the energy you finish with, and transitioning between those two states as slowly as possible so you lose energy as slowly as possible.

“The difficult thing is that all of these factors are in conflict with each other and in a really complex way.”