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The quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) generates an approximate solution to combinatorial optimization problems using a variational ansatz circuit defined by parameterized layers of quantum evolution. In theory, the…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2021-09-24 Rebekah Herrman , Phillip C. Lotshaw , James Ostrowski , Travis S. Humble , George Siopsis

Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA) is one of the most promising candidates to achieve the quantum advantage in solving combinatorial optimization problems. The process of finding a good set of variational parameters in the…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2025-07-18 Kien X. Nguyen , Bao Bach , Ilya Safro

Variational quantum algorithms (VQAs) are widely applied in the noisy intermediate-scale quantum era and are expected to demonstrate quantum advantage. However, training VQAs faces difficulties, one of which is the so-called barren plateaus…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2023-02-07 Huan-Yu Liu , Tai-Ping Sun , Yu-Chun Wu , Yong-Jian Han , Guo-Ping Guo

Two main challenges preventing efficient training of variational quantum algorithms and quantum machine learning models are local minima and barren plateaus. Typically, barren plateaus are associated with deep circuits, while shallow…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2025-02-10 Nikita A. Nemkov , Evgeniy O. Kiktenko , Aleksey K. Fedorov

Quantum Approximate Optimization algorithm (QAOA) aims to search for approximate solutions to discrete optimization problems with near-term quantum computers. As there are no algorithmic guarantee possible for QAOA to outperform classical…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2022-07-25 Bingzhi Zhang , Akira Sone , Quntao Zhuang

Training quantum neural networks (QNNs) using gradient-based or gradient-free classical optimisation approaches is severely impacted by the presence of barren plateaus in the cost landscapes. In this paper, we devise a framework for…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2024-06-04 Yidong Liao , Min-Hsiu Hsieh , Chris Ferrie

The quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) is a variational quantum algorithm (VQA) ideal for noisy intermediate-scale quantum (NISQ) processors, and is highly successful in solving combinatorial optimization problems (COPs). It…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2026-03-23 Francesco Aldo Venturelli , Sreetama Das , Filippo Caruso

The quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) promises to solve classically intractable computational problems in the area of combinatorial optimization. A growing amount of evidence suggests that the originally proposed form of the…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2022-05-04 Michelle Chalupnik , Hans Melo , Yuri Alexeev , Alexey Galda

We propose and study Th-QAOA (pronounced Threshold QAOA), a variation of the Quantum Alternating Operator Ansatz (QAOA) that replaces the standard phase separator operator, which encodes the objective function, with a threshold function…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2022-06-06 John Golden , Andreas Bärtschi , Daniel O'Malley , Stephan Eidenbenz

Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA) is a hybrid algorithm whose control parameters are classically optimized. In addition to the variational parameters, the right choice of hyperparameter is crucial for improving the…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2022-06-30 Yu Pan , Yifan Tong , Yi Yang

The quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) is a promising quantum-classical hybrid technique to solve combinatorial optimization problems in near-term gate-based noisy quantum devices. In QAOA, the objective is a function of the…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2019-07-24 Mahabubul Alam , Abdullah Ash-Saki , Swaroop Ghosh

The quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) is one of the most promising candidates for achieving quantum advantage through quantum-enhanced combinatorial optimization. Optimal QAOA parameter concentration effects for special…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2024-07-10 Jose Falla , Quinn Langfitt , Yuri Alexeev , Ilya Safro

Variational quantum algorithms (VQAs) have demonstrated considerable potential in solving NP-hard combinatorial problems in the contemporary near intermediate-scale quantum (NISQ) era. The quantum approximate optimisation algorithm (QAOA)…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2024-05-09 Boy Choy , David J. Wales

QAOA is a hybrid quantum-classical algorithm to solve optimization problems in gate-based quantum computers. It is based on a variational quantum circuit that can be interpreted as a discretization of the annealing process that quantum…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2025-05-28 Francisco Chicano , Zakaria Abdelmoiz Dahi , Gabriel Luque

Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithms (QAOA) promise efficient solutions to classically intractable combinatorial optimization problems by harnessing shallow-depth quantum circuits. Yet, their performance and scalability often hinge…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2025-05-02 Kuan-Cheng Chen , Hiromichi Matsuyama , Wei-Hao Huang

The Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA) is a general purpose quantum algorithm designed for combinatorial optimization. We analyze its expected performance and prove concentration properties at any constant level (number of…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2023-07-19 Joao Basso , David Gamarnik , Song Mei , Leo Zhou

Constrained combinatorial optimization with strict linear constraints underpins applications in drug discovery, power grids, logistics, and finance, yet remains computationally demanding for classical algorithms, especially at large scales.…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2026-04-07 Yajie Hao , Qiming Ding , Xiao Yuan , Xiaoting Wang

Variational quantum algorithms is one of the most representative algorithms in quantum computing, which has a wide range of applications in quantum machine learning, quantum simulation and other related fields. However, they face challenges…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2024-02-22 Xiao Shi , Yun Shang

The quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA) is a hybrid variational quantum-classical algorithm that solves combinatorial optimization problems. While there is evidence suggesting that the fixed form of the standard QAOA ansatz is…

The Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA) is a hybrid quantum-classical algorithm that shows promise in efficiently solving the MaxCut problem, a representative example of combinatorial optimization. However, its effectiveness…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2025-01-22 Fanxu Meng , Xiangzhen Zhou , Pengcheng Zhu , Yu Luo