On October 22, 2025, Google Quantum AI announced the successful implementation of its "Quantum Echoes" algorithm on its in-house Willow quantum chip, achieving a speed advantage of approximately 13,000x over leading classical supercomputers on comparable tasks. The paper has been published in Nature. This algorithm, which can be used for molecular structure calculations, is being positioned as "the first verifiable algorithm run on quantum hardware," aiming to enable independent verification of quantum results and to serve a wider range of scientific research and AI data generation.
This progress follows the 2019 achievement of "quantum advantage" in random circuit sampling and the 2024 breakthrough in quantum error correction achieved by Willow. Numerous media outlets and academic commentators have hailed this as a significant step toward practical quantum computing, while also noting that production-ready fault-tolerant quantum systems still require the coordinated development of large-scale, low-error hardware and software.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What does “13,000×” refer to this time?
A: On selected tasks, Quantum Echoes achieves approximately 1/13,000th the time of the best algorithms on top classical supercomputers on Willow. Source: Google blog post and paper.
Q: What does “verifiable algorithm” mean?
A: Quantum output can be independently verified through computable controls or statistical methods, unlike early benchmarks that only showed speed and were difficult to verify.
Q: How does it relate to the results in 2019 and 2024?
A: 2019 demonstrated its speed advantage, and 2024 Willow made progress in error correction. This time, we combined "speed + verifiability" to target practical scientific computing.
Q: Can it be immediately used in drug or material design?
A: It is an important milestone, but it is still early days; full application requires larger-scale, low-error fault-tolerant quantum machines.
Q: Is Google the only one to reach a conclusion?
A: In addition to official reports, Reuters, the Guardian and other newspapers reported and quoted expert opinions; the paper was published in Nature to facilitate peer review and replication.
