How to sort LEGO pieces by part family

Sort your LEGO by part family if you must sort it. Better yet, don't sort it at all unless you are an adult builder or a very serious teenage builder. Shallow tubs of mixed LEGO pieces drive the highest levels of creativity and require the least amount of work to maintain. Stop creating work for yourself as a parent trying to keep your kid's LEGO pieces sorted.

If you have a child or teen that wants to sort their LEGO pieces to support a more advanced building style, it is more effective to sort by part family. Just don't sort it by color.

For example, bricks of all sizes go in one container, plates in another, slopes, tile, and so on.

When we talk about bricks, we describe them by the number of studs or knobs on their short edge and then their long edge.

It is much easier to dig in a tub of bricks and find a red 2x4 brick than to dig in a tub of red LEGO pieces and find a red 2x4 brick.

If your collection is large enough to warrant the effort, you could then split your bricks into two tubs: one of 1x brick and one of 2x bricks.

If your collection is larger still, you may want a tub of just 1x1 bricks and a tub of just 1x2 bricks and so on.

In that tub, you may want to bag each color individually if it makes sense for you.