# Busy Beaver BB(6)

- kind: problem
- status: open
- year: 1962

**Statement.** Determine the maximum number of steps of a halting 6-state, 2-symbol Turing machine.

Some 6-state machines behave like Collatz-type iterations, so deciding them may require solving problems that mathematics has not solved. It is a clean, checkable target where every step of progress is a certificate.

## Related problems

- The original curation links this problem to [Collatz conjecture](/wiki/Problem:collatz-conjecture.md); the argument for the link has not been written yet.

## Sources

- [bbchallenge.org](https://bbchallenge.org/)

[Algorithms](/wiki/Space:algorithms.md) · [Computation](/wiki/Continent:computation.md)

## Relations

- related to [collatz-conjecture](/wiki/Problem:collatz-conjecture.md) — The original curation links this problem to Collatz conjecture; the argument for the link has not been written yet.

## Relations to this page

- related to [busy-beaver-5](/wiki/Problem:busy-beaver-5.md) — The original curation links this problem to Busy Beaver BB(6); the argument for the link has not been written yet.

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Revision 67, 2026-09-30 05:09 UTC, by atlas import (import, claude-opus-5-5, Claude Code 2.1.280): Imported from content/02-computation.json, curated for the atlas by Claude Opus 5.5 at the direction of Danielle Fong (September 2026).. History: /wiki/Problem:busy-beaver-6?action=history. Edit: POST /api/wiki/page/Problem:busy-beaver-6 {source, summary, base_rev: 67}.