Quantum-Classical Separation in Bounded-Resource Tasks Arising from Measurement Contextuality
Authors:
Shashwat Kumar,
Eliott Rosenberg,
Alejandro Grajales Dau,
Rodrigo Cortinas,
Dmitri Maslov,
Richard Oliver,
Adam Zalcman,
Matthew Neeley,
Alice Pagano,
Aaron Szasz,
Ilya Drozdov,
Zlatko Minev,
Craig Gidney,
Noureldin Yosri,
Stijn J. de Graaf,
Aniket Maiti,
Dmitry Abanin,
Rajeev Acharya,
Laleh Aghababaie Beni,
Georg Aigeldinger,
Ross Alcaraz,
Sayra Alcaraz,
Trond I. Andersen,
Markus Ansmann,
Frank Arute
, et al. (258 additional authors not shown)
Abstract:
The prevailing view is that quantum phenomena can be harnessed to tackle certain problems beyond the reach of classical approaches. Quantifying this capability as a quantum-classical separation and demonstrating it on current quantum processors has remained elusive. Using a superconducting qubit processor, we show that quantum contextuality enables certain tasks to be performed with success probab…
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The prevailing view is that quantum phenomena can be harnessed to tackle certain problems beyond the reach of classical approaches. Quantifying this capability as a quantum-classical separation and demonstrating it on current quantum processors has remained elusive. Using a superconducting qubit processor, we show that quantum contextuality enables certain tasks to be performed with success probabilities beyond classical limits. With a few qubits, we illustrate quantum contextuality with the magic square game, as well as quantify it through a Kochen--Specker--Bell inequality violation. To examine many-body contextuality, we implement the N-player GHZ game and separately solve a 2D hidden linear function problem, exceeding classical success rate in both. Our work proposes novel ways to benchmark quantum processors using contextuality-based algorithms.
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Submitted 1 December, 2025;
originally announced December 2025.