A synthesis machine for preparation of a targeted inorganic material for recommended synthesis by a computer program that determines optimal solid-state methods for synthesis of an inorganic material. The computational method involves inputting a target inorganic material, querying structural data and thermodynamic data for the target inorganic material, enumerating possible synthetic reactions to construct a synthetic reaction database with a viable subset of the possible synthetic methods. The routine generates a nucleation metric and competition metric that are combined to provide recommended synthetic methods. The output for each of the recommended syntheses are input into a robotic synthesis machine where the delivery of reactants, reaction conditions, and analysis of extent of reaction, and product quality is controlled by a processor.