Apologies if this breaks any rules about promotion, but Limited Run Games is a pretty cool outfit, and this is some pretty awesome merch.
this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2025
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It is done entirely with magnets.
There's a few ways it can be arranged, but typically, there will be a large, powerful magnet in the base, a small magnet at the bottom of the floating object that is attracted to the big magnet (to keep the object upright), and a series of other magnets around the object that are repelled by the big magnet (to make it float).
I've seen some that use a secondary "key" magnet on the base and object that is the opposite polarity of the base magnet, that forces the object to sit in a specific orientation. Otherwise, the object can just kind of freely spin/float, so long as the bottom magnet stays pointing down.
That sounds cool af and difficult to get a system in balance like that. Do you know of any videos anywhere where someone has magnets like that set up?
I don't know of any videos, but the concept seems to have gotten pretty popular in the last year or two. I'm in the 3D printing community, and there's pretty frequently a "magic floating <whatever>" in the "popular" section.
I assume the most difficult part would be determining what size magnets to use to achieve the desired float height. The rest should (in theory) be relatively simple; the magnets' natural characteristics do all the hard work.