provider:ibm-flex

IBM Quantum — Flex Plan

IBM Heron r2 / r3 (156Q) · superconducting · 156 physical qubits · 99.70% 2Q fidelity

verified primary

Pricing model

Pre-purchased per-minute. 400-minute annual minimum at $72/min, a $28,800 floor, usable within a 12-month window.

1.Representative workload costs

Concrete circuit costs for common workload sizes. Where the pricing model is non-linear (per-program minimums, per-month subscriptions), the table surfaces the floor and break-even points.

Table 1 — Workload cost reference

Workload	Cost (USD)	Note
400-minute annual minimum	$28,800	400 minutes of QPU runtime over 12 months, the smallest Flex commitment IBM publishes.
Single VQE optimisation (~30 min)	$2,160	Vs $2,880 at PAYG — 25% saving once you commit.
Sustained 30 min/week for 12 months	$112,320 nominal	Well beyond the 400-minute minimum; every minute bills at $72.

2.Structural hardware advantage

25% rate reduction vs PAYG ($72 vs $96/min) for buyers willing to commit $28,800 up-front. The 12-month usage window is generous compared to typical pre-purchase quotas.

3.Position in the 2026 stack

Production, committed buyers. Launched Q1 2026 to bridge IBM's pricing gap between Open Plan (free, capped) and Premium (enterprise contract). Moor Insights flagged this as IBM's most-needed pricing addition.

4.Best-fit workloads

Research groups with 12-month grant funding for quantum experiments
Industrial pilot programmes with committed minute budgets
Hackathon coordinators committing centrally for multi-user access

5.Pricing trap

Watch for: The $28,800 minimum is non-refundable if unused. Estimate annual usage carefully — small research groups often overcommit and let minutes expire.

Verification note. IBM's pricing page states Flex starts at $72 USD per minute with a 400-minute annual minimum, a $28,800 annual floor. Read directly 2026-09-07.

6.Source

https://www.ibm.com/quantum/pricing · verified 2026-09-07