Quantum computers in 2026: status and encryption

Quantum computers have had two years of records. None of them, however, has yet calculated anything companies need. The big manufacturers promise a useful fault-tolerant machine for 2029. Encryption has to change sooner, because data stolen today could be decrypted later.

What has been achieved in the last two years?

When	Who	What they showed
December 2024	Google, Willow chip	105 qubits; each time the error-correcting code was enlarged, the error rate fell by roughly half
November 2025	Quantinuum, Helios	98 qubits made of barium ions; full error correction on 48 logical qubits
July 2026	IBM and the University of Chicago	a computation with a verifiable result on 70 logical qubits, so far as a preprint

A logical qubit is a group of physical qubits that watch over each other and correct errors. Only logical qubits will be able to compute long enough for useful tasks. In 2024 Google was the first to show that a larger code really does reduce errors instead of adding them.

Sources: Google, Willow, Nature, Acharya et al., Quantinuum, IBM, arXiv:2607.25941

Why take the records with a pinch of salt?

Willow solved a test task in 5 minutes that would take a supercomputer 10 septillion years (a number with 25 zeros). Google itself writes that this task has no practical commercial use yet.
Quantinuum reports 94 logical qubits entangled in a single state and 50 logical qubits that can detect errors. It demonstrated full error correction on 48 logical qubits.
In February 2025 Microsoft presented the Majorana 1 chip with 8 topological qubits. The editors of Nature added a note to the paper saying the results do not represent evidence of topological modes, and many physicists at the American Physical Society meeting expressed doubts.

Sources: Google, Willow, Quantinuum, APS Physics

When will a useful quantum computer arrive?

Company	Goal	Year
IBM	Starling: 200 logical qubits and 100 million operations	2029
Quantinuum	Apollo: fully fault-tolerant	2029
Microsoft	a scalable computer with Majorana qubits	2029

For now these are only company plans. For comparison, Willow has 105 physical qubits and Helios 98.

Sources: IBM, Starling, Quantinuum, Apollo, Microsoft, Majorana 2

Why deal with post-quantum cryptography today?

In 2025 Craig Gidney of Google estimated that RSA with a 2048-bit key could be broken by a computer with fewer than a million noisy qubits in less than a week. In 2019 the estimate was 20 million qubits and eight hours. An attacker can also store encrypted data today and decrypt it once such a machine exists.

Deadlines for moving to post-quantum cryptography are already set:

In the USA, the standards body NIST published the first three standards (ML-KEM, ML-DSA and SLH-DSA) in August 2024. According to its report of 27 October 2026, RSA and elliptic-curve cryptography are deprecated after 2030 and will not be allowed under NIST standards after 2035. The most sensitive federal systems must move sooner: key establishment by the end of 2030, digital signatures by the end of 2031.
In the EU, under the recommended roadmap, Member States should have a national transition plan by the end of 2026. High-risk systems should be migrated by the end of 2030 and medium-risk ones by the end of 2035.
In Czechia, NÚKIB joined a statement by 18 EU countries in January 2025 saying the most sensitive systems should move ideally by 2030 at the latest. What NÚKIB requires of companies under the new Cybersecurity Act is covered in the article A year of the new Czech Cybersecurity Act.

Sources: Gidney, NIST, standards, NIST IR 8547, European Commission, NÚKIB

Does Czechia have a quantum computer too?

The VLQ quantum computer has been running at IT4Innovations at VŠB in Ostrava since 23 September 2025. It has 24 superconducting qubits, operates at 0.01 kelvin and is connected to the Karolina supercomputer. It cost about CZK 125 million; half was paid by the EuroHPC Joint Undertaking and half by a consortium of 13 partners from 8 countries led by Czechia.

Since July 2026 VLQ has been open to users. Czech researchers apply for time through IT4Innovations grant calls, other Europeans through EuroHPC calls. The first 16 projects are mainly in materials research and computer science. IT4Innovations also expects companies to use it.

Sources: IT4Innovations, launch (in Czech), IT4Innovations, first users (in Czech)

How many people work in the field?

According to the industry consortium QED-C, 16,482 people worked at companies focused solely on quantum technologies in 2025, 14% more than in 2024. In 2025 companies advertised 8,261 new quantum-related positions. The whole market was worth USD 1.9 billion in 2025.

Source: QED-C, 2026

Summary

Quantum computers are improving, but manufacturers promise a useful fault-tolerant machine only for 2029.
The move to post-quantum cryptography has set deadlines: the EU recommends 2030 for high-risk systems, and in the USA RSA and elliptic curves will be deprecated after 2030.
Czechia has its own quantum computer, VLQ in Ostrava. Since July 2026 the first research projects have been running on it.

If the move to post-quantum cryptography means you need a security or cryptography specialist on your team, get in touch and tell us who you need. The fields we recruit in are on the expertise page.

As of 1 November 2026.