Fri Mar 14 14:10:00 UTC 2025: ## D-Wave’s Quantum Supremacy Claim Challenged by Classical Laptop Calculations
**New York/Lausanne, Switzerland** – D-Wave Systems, a leading quantum computing company, has faced a significant challenge to its claim that its Advantage2 quantum computer can solve problems intractable for classical computers. Two independent research groups have demonstrated that a standard laptop, using advanced classical algorithms, can replicate D-Wave’s calculations in a fraction of the time previously estimated.
D-Wave’s recently published *Science* paper asserted that its quantum computer could solve specific transverse field Ising model problems—a type of quantum calculation—that would take hundreds of years on a classical supercomputer. However, researchers at New York University (NYU), led by Dries Sels, achieved similar results on a standard laptop in just two hours using tensor network methods. These methods optimize data processing, significantly reducing computational demands.
Separately, Linda Mauron and Giuseppe Carleo at EPFL in Lausanne, Switzerland, demonstrated that the same problems could be solved using either minimal quantum entanglement or simulations on a classical computer with four GPUs in three days. They argue that these calculations could be further optimized to exceed the scale of D-Wave’s results within a week.
D-Wave has countered these findings, asserting that the classical simulations did not replicate the full scope and complexity of their calculations, pointing to further, unpublished results involving larger qubit numbers as evidence of quantum supremacy. However, Sels dismissed this response as “petty,” arguing that the tensor network approach easily scales to larger problems. Carleo similarly suggests that D-Wave should refrain from making bold claims of “beyond-classical” computation until such claims are more thoroughly substantiated.
This is not the first time claims of quantum supremacy have been contested. Similar challenges have been leveled against Google’s Sycamore quantum computer in the past. The ongoing debate highlights the difficulties in definitively establishing a quantum computer’s advantage over classical systems and underscores the need for rigorous validation of any such claims. The scientific community awaits further evidence and analysis to determine whether D-Wave’s Advantage2 truly offers a computational advantage over even relatively modest classical computing resources.
First Piper 