# Quantinuum reports five errors per million operations on one logical qubit

_Published Tuesday, October 20, 2026 at 9:19 AM EDT · Science · Latest · Tier 2 — Notable_

![A close-up of a gold colored quantum computing chip. — Primary](https://www.sciencenews.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2026/10/101926_EC_megaquop_main.jpg)

Quantinuum researchers reported five errors in a million operations on a single logical qubit built from 37 physical qubits, Science News reported. Their paper, posted October 19 on the company's website and arXiv, describes experiments on the 98-qubit Helios ion-based quantum computer.

Quantum error correction combines physical qubits into a logical qubit that is less prone to mistakes. Errors fell by a factor of about 10 as the researchers increased logical-qubit size, compared with about 2 in a previous Google demonstration. Lower error rates could reduce the physical qubits needed for reliable calculations, but the experiment used only one logical qubit; a million-reliable-operation machine could possibly require around 50 to 100.

## Sources

- [Science News](https://www.sciencenews.org/article/quantum-computer-megaquops-error-correction)

---
Canonical: https://techandbusiness.org/newswire/KnWS9oRuPFTO8WB3QsvWSl
Published: 2026-10-20T13:19:24.751Z
Story chronology: 2026-10-19T00:00:00.000Z
Retrieved: 2026-10-20T16:19:26.451Z
Publisher: Tech & Business (techandbusiness.org)