Tested: Sugru - the 'magic glue' which can fix anything (even iPhones)

Sugru looks like a tiny silver sachet of Blu-Tac but the substance has been described as “magical” - a UK-invented self-setting rubber which turns anyone into a DIY overlord who can fix anything.

Sugru became a hit in the US, but is creeping into UK stores, one by one - with Wilko, Blacks and B&Q now stocking the doughy rubber which can fix anything from broken headphones to broken stoves.

Sugru is like permanent Blu-Tac, and capable of fixing a surprising number of objects that would otherwise be taking a trip either to the dump, or to one of those drawers where you put stuff you might fix one day (but never will).

At £12.99 a pack, at first it’s difficult to believe it can work - but leave Sugru to dry for 24 hours at room temperature, and it solidifies into a rubber that means objects can leave the “broken” drawer and return to the world. Even objects destined for tough lives - like toys.

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The plasticine-like substance can even fix tricky jobs like broken toy cars (sadly not in time to prevent the flood of tears at the time) - with a discreet blob turning into solid rubber overnight, rendering the toy roadworthy. This can reduce the average parent’s toy budget by hundreds of pounds a month.

How tough Sugru is (once solidified) can be gauged by the DIY cults it has inspired - people have made diving masks, handles for fencing foils and even parts for archers’ bows with the sludge. Sugru, once you start fixing things, is oddly addictive.

The ultimate test though, was my glasses. Like most toddlers, my son hates glasses (much like the Khmer Rouge, who often killed wearers as potential bourgeois reactionaries), and my current pair has a leg hanging on by one metal thread. A screw is missing.

One discreet blob, 24 hours of prayer, and they worked again - unlike traditional glue, Sugru is less prone to cracking along the join - although I have no doubt my son will destroy the specs permanently in the end.

It even comes in different colours (£12.99 buys you a pack of eight colours), so you can repair headphones, say, without a colour clash. You can it into blobs like Play-Doh, smear it over broken surfaces - then wait for the magic to happen.

It isn’t magic, of course, but it’s glorious fixing something without mixing epoxy resins that have to be held together by hand for an hour, or dealing with superglue which somehow prefers to stick your fingers together than anything you actually want.



Sugru can’t fix anything - broken hearts, sadly, are out - but it’ll work on wood, metal, plastic and even porous stone. You can fix (some) bits of cars with it. It's also waterproof and electrically insulating.

Taking a DAB Radio where the casing had split, I’d grown to accept that the wooden surround hung off it like a half-destroyed shack. A few blobs of Sugru along the broken bits, and it was suddenly a radio again - rather than something that guests thought, “God, those poor people, how can they live like that?”

From now on, no more throwing away - just Sugru. There are a few metals and plastics it won’t stick to, but frankly those gadgets are going in the bin. If it doesn’t work with my magic clay, it has no place in my home.

Find out more about Sugru here