IBM Recommends New Cloud-Based Notebook Environments for Qiskit

On Jun 3, 2024

IBM has announced new recommendations for cloud-based notebook environments for Qiskit users. The company has endorsed OVHcloud and qBraid as preferred providers for those looking to work with Qiskit over the cloud, according to IBM Quantum Computing Blog.

New Recommendations Align with IBM’s Strategic Shifts

The announcement comes in the wake of IBM’s recent retirement of the IBM Quantum Lab, signaling a broader strategic shift towards utility-scale quantum computation. This move aims to support the continuous growth of the Qiskit ecosystem by providing users with convenient, cloud-based Jupyter environments pre-installed with Qiskit.

Getting Started with OVHcloud

Users of OVHcloud Public Cloud and OVHcloud Startup can now utilize OVHcloud quantum notebooks to access Qiskit and submit jobs to IBM Quantum hardware. Below are the steps to get started:

Setting Up OVHcloud AI Notebooks:

Visit the OVHcloud landing page and create a free account.
Log in, navigate to the Public Cloud page, and click on “Create an AI Notebook”.
Click on “+ Create a notebook”, select JupyterLab, choose Qiskit, set privacy settings, and select a datacenter location.

Getting Started with qBraid Lab

qBraid, a cloud-based platform for quantum software development, has also been recommended by IBM. Users of Qiskit SDK v1.0 and the recently released v1.1 can transition their work to qBraid’s pre-configured Python environments. Here are the steps to get started:

Setting Up qBraid Lab:

Visit the qBraid Lab landing page and create a free account.
Log in, navigate to the Lab page, and click “Start Machine” in the free tier.

Other Notebook Environments for Qiskit Users

In addition to OVHcloud and qBraid, Qiskit can also be installed in other popular notebook environments such as IBM Watson Studio, Google Colab, and Microsoft Azure Machine Learning Studio. Below are the general steps for these platforms:

IBM Watson Studio:

Visit the Watson Studio landing page and create an IBM Cloud account.
Start a new project, open a new notebook, and run pip install qiskit.

Google Colab:

Microsoft Azure Machine Learning Studio:

Visit the Azure landing page and create a free trial account.
Create a new workspace, open a new notebook, and run pip install qiskit.

These steps provide a comprehensive guide to getting started with Qiskit in various cloud-based notebook environments, ensuring users have the flexibility to choose the platform that best meets their needs.

Image source: Shutterstock

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