About
Qubit16
A quantum computing education platform built on one belief: you understand a qubit faster by watching it than by reading about it, and faster still by running a real circuit yourself than by watching someone else run one.
Why this exists
Most ways to learn quantum computing today ask you to pick a side early. Video courses and interactive-visual platforms explain the ideas well but stop short of letting you run anything real. Notebook-based tools like Qiskit give you the real thing — actual circuit execution against a real simulator — but hand you a blank notebook and a textbook of math with no guided path through it. University courses split the difference but ask for a multi-week commitment before you know if the subject is for you.
Qubit16 is built to not make you choose. Every visualization is interactive and computed in your browser, not a video. Every circuit you build runs on a real backend — Qiskit and Aer under the hood — not a canned animation. And when you get stuck, an AI tutor is there to explain specifically what you are looking at, not a search box pointed at a forum.
What’s actually different
- Real, not simulated-to-look-real. Circuits run against Qiskit/Aer (and PennyLane), the same libraries used in research and industry — not a hand-rolled approximation built to look convincing in a demo.
- Zero install. No Jupyter, no Python environment, no package versions to fight. Open a browser tab and you are running circuits in seconds.
- Guided, not just reference material. A structured course sits alongside the tools, so “what should I try next” has an answer, and an AI tutor can see the actual circuit you built when you ask it a question about it — inspecting the statevector step by step, diffing two circuits to show exactly where they diverge, or fetching an arXiv abstract when a question calls for a primary source.
- Free to start, honestly. The simulator, the visualizations, the lessons and the challenges are free with no account required — see pricing for what paid plans add (mainly: running circuits on real quantum hardware, which costs money per job regardless of who is offering it).
- Built to fight forgetting, not just teach once. A spaced-repetition queue at /review brings quiz questions back right before you’d normally forget them — the same idea behind Quantum Country’s essays, applied to this course. It is the one thing reviewers consistently say self-paced free courses are missing.
How it’s built
Qubit16 is an open-source quantum mechanics learning platform. The visualizations and circuit editor run client-side; circuit execution is backed by real Qiskit/Aer and PennyLane simulators; the AI tutor uses a cheapest-first provider chain so answering a question does not depend on any one vendor. Progress and skill tracking are local-first — your learning data lives in your own browser by default, not on a server you have to trust.
Get in touch
Found a bug, have a feature request, or want to talk about using Qubit16 for a class or a team? Reach out through the account page if you’re signed in, or start at the homepage to explore what’s here first.