Xanadu
Xanadu is a Toronto-based photonic quantum computing company building cloud-accessible continuous- variable quantum processors based on squeezed states of light. Founded in 2016 by Christian Weedbrook and listed on TSX/Nasdaq (XNDU), Xanadu demonstrated a 50-million-fold Gaussian-boson-sampling speedup with Borealis in 2022 and published modular networked photonic quantum computing in Nature in 2025. Beyond hardware, Xanadu is one of the most prolific open-source contributors in quantum software — it maintains PennyLane (the de-facto cross-platform quantum ML framework), Strawberry Fields, MrMustard, The Walrus, Blackbird, Catalyst, Lightning, and FlamingPy, all under Apache-2.0. Xanadu's own Quantum Cloud was retired in January 2026; the company's developer surface is now centered entirely on its open-source stack and integrations with third-party QPUs.
More than an index entry, but the surface is still mostly links rather than artifacts — the cohort most likely to move a full band from modest, well-targeted work.
API Evangelist profiles Xanadu the way a machine reads it — 37 machine-readable artifacts across 10 APIs, pulled from the provider's own public surface and indexed so a developer, an analyst, or an AI agent can evaluate it against every other provider on the network.
Every provider in the network is reduced to the same set of machine-readable artifacts — OpenAPI contracts, event specifications, GraphQL schemas, runnable collections, pricing and rate-limit signals, security posture, OAuth scopes, and the agent surfaces (MCP servers and skills) that let software drive the API on its own. We profile them because the interface is the part of a company you can actually inspect: it is a truer signal of what a provider does than any marketing page. From those artifacts we compute the Kin Score — Xanadu scores 29.5/100 (emerging), with a separate agent-readiness read of 7/100 (human only). The full breakdown is below, followed by every artifact we hold — each card links through to its machine-readable definition on apis.io.
Kin Score
This is the API Evangelist rating — a single, repeatable read computed from the artifacts on this page. Green fill is points earned; the red track is points possible, so every bar shows earned-versus-possible at a glance.
Kin Score
How this is scored →scored 2026-07-27 · rubric v0.5
How we profile Xanadu
Each block below is one kind of artifact we hold for Xanadu. For each we say what it is and why it earns a place in the profile, then list every one we've indexed — capped at two rows, scroll within the panel for the rest.
APIs 10
Each API is captured as its own OpenAPI definition — every operation, parameter, and response. This is the single most useful machine-readable description of what an API does, and it's what lets us score, lint, mock, and generate against it without asking the provider for anything.
Individual APIs this provider publishes, each with its own machine-readable definition.
PennyLane
PennyLane is the cross-platform Python framework for quantum computing, quantum machine learning, and quantum chemistry maintained by Xanadu. It provides automatic differentiati...
Catalyst
Catalyst is a JIT compiler for hybrid quantum-classical programs written in PennyLane. Built on MLIR, it lowers PennyLane circuits to native machine code with quantum control fl...
PennyLane Lightning
Lightning is the family of high-performance state-vector and tensor-network quantum simulators written in C++ for PennyLane. Includes lightning.qubit (CPU), lightning.gpu (CUDA)...
Strawberry Fields
Strawberry Fields is Xanadu's full-stack Python library for designing, simulating, and optimizing continuous-variable (CV) photonic quantum circuits. It ships Gaussian, Fock, Te...
MrMustard
MrMustard is a differentiable quantum-optics simulator that bridges phase space and Fock space with pluggable NumPy and JAX backends. It performs fast exact Fock-amplitude compu...
The Walrus
The Walrus is a Python/C++ library for the fast calculation of hafnians, loop hafnians, and multidimensional Hermite polynomials — the linear-algebra primitives behind Gaussian ...
Blackbird
Blackbird is Xanadu's quantum assembly language and intermediate representation for continuous-variable photonic quantum computation. It is used to program Xanadu's photonic har...
PennyLane-Qiskit Plugin
PennyLane plugin that integrates IBM's Qiskit framework and IBM Q hardware as PennyLane devices for differentiable quantum programming. Apache-2.0.
FlamingPy
FlamingPy is Xanadu's cross-platform Python library for efficient simulation of error correction in fault-tolerant photonic quantum computers, with a variety of pluggable decode...
Xanadu Cloud Client
Xanadu Cloud Client (xcc) is the Python API and CLI that historically connected users to Xanadu's photonic quantum cloud (Borealis, X-series). Xanadu's Quantum Cloud was retired...
Scroll within the panel for all 10 ·
Features 7
The notable capabilities this provider advertises, captured as structured features so they can be searched and compared instead of read one landing page at a time.
Notable capabilities this provider offers.
Photonic Quantum Hardware
Continuous-variable photonic quantum processors based on squeezed states of light, including the Borealis Gaussian-boson-sampling device and the Aurora modular system targeting ...
PennyLane Open-Source Framework
Hardware-agnostic Python framework for differentiable quantum programming across PyTorch, JAX, TensorFlow, and NumPy with first-class quantum machine learning and quantum chemis...
Plugin Ecosystem
Plugins connect PennyLane to IBM Qiskit, AWS Braket, Google Cirq, IonQ, Rigetti, Microsoft QDK, Quantinuum/Honeywell, Qulacs, and Xanadu's own Strawberry Fields.
Lightning High-Performance Simulators
C++ state-vector and tensor-network simulators with CPU, CUDA GPU, Kokkos, and tensor backends for laptop-to-HPC quantum circuit simulation.
Catalyst JIT Compiler
MLIR-based just-in-time compiler that lowers PennyLane hybrid quantum-classical programs to native code with quantum control flow and end-to-end differentiation.
Photonic Software Stack
Strawberry Fields, MrMustard, The Walrus, Blackbird, and FlamingPy provide continuous-variable simulation, differentiable optics, Gaussian-boson-sampling primitives, an assembly...
Quantum Codebook and QML Hub
Interactive Xanadu Quantum Codebook plus the pennylane.ai/qml hub with hundreds of research demos covering quantum machine learning, chemistry, and algorithms.
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Semantic Vocabularies 1
JSON-LD contexts give the data shared meaning across APIs. We profile them because semantics are what let a machine reconcile 'customer' here with 'customer' somewhere else.
JSON-LD contexts and semantic vocabularies used across these APIs.
Xanadu Context
JSON-LDSpectral Rules 1
Governance rulesets we run against this provider's specs — the automated checks behind parts of the score. Profiling them makes the quality bar explicit and re-runnable, not a matter of opinion.
Xanadu API Rules
SPECTRALJSON Schema 1
Standalone JSON Schema definitions describe the data models behind the API. We profile them so the shapes are validatable on their own — useful long after a single request is forgotten.
Standalone JSON Schema definitions for this provider's data models.
PennyLane Device
JSON SCHEMASecurity Posture 1
Authentication, domain security, vulnerability disclosure, and trust-center signals — the evidence that a provider takes security seriously enough to document it. We profile it because you can't govern what you can't see.
Authentication, domain security, vulnerability disclosure, and trust-center signals.
Use Cases 6
What developers actually build with this provider — captured so the catalogue answers 'what is this for', not just 'what does this expose'.
What developers build with this provider.
Quantum Machine Learning Research
Train hybrid quantum-classical models with automatic differentiation against simulators and real QPUs through a single PennyLane API.
Quantum Chemistry
Run variational quantum eigensolver and chemistry workflows via pennylane.qchem, including ground state, excited state, and dynamics simulations.
Photonic Algorithm Research
Design continuous-variable algorithms — Gaussian boson sampling, graph optimization, molecular vibronic spectra — in Strawberry Fields and MrMustard.
Fault-Tolerant Architecture Studies
Use FlamingPy to simulate and benchmark photonic fault-tolerant quantum-computing architectures and decoders.
HPC-Scale Quantum Simulation
Run large state-vector and tensor-network simulations on multi-GPU and multi-node clusters with Lightning + Catalyst.
Quantum Education
Teach undergraduates and researchers quantum computing through the Xanadu Quantum Codebook, QHack, and the pennylane.ai demo library.
Integrations 10
Pre-built integrations with other platforms tell you where this provider already fits in a stack.
Pre-built integrations with other platforms and tools.
IBM Qiskit / IBM Quantum
PennyLane-Qiskit plugin exposes IBM Q hardware and Qiskit simulators as PennyLane devices.
AWS Braket
PennyLane plugin for Amazon Braket lets PennyLane circuits run against Braket-managed simulators and partner QPUs.
Google Cirq
PennyLane-Cirq plugin integrates Google's Cirq simulators.
IonQ
PennyLane-IonQ plugin targets IonQ trapped-ion simulators and hardware.
Rigetti
PennyLane-Rigetti plugin connects to Rigetti Forest QPUs and the QVM.
Quantinuum / Honeywell
PennyLane-Honeywell plugin targets Quantinuum's trapped-ion systems.
Microsoft Quantum Development Kit
PennyLane-qsharp plugin connects PennyLane to the Microsoft QDK simulators.
Qulacs
PennyLane-Qulacs plugin provides access to the Qulacs simulator.
PyTorch / JAX / TensorFlow / NumPy
First-class differentiable interfaces for every major Python ML framework.
NVIDIA cuQuantum
Lightning GPU and Lightning Tensor leverage NVIDIA cuQuantum for accelerated simulation.
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Resources
Every other property we hold for Xanadu — documentation, portals, status pages, policies, and corporate surface — grouped by the job it does, following the integrator's arc from getting started to running in production.
Get Started 2
Portal, sign-up, and the first successful call
Documentation 2
Reference material describing how the API behaves
Build 4
SDKs, sample code, and the tooling you integrate with
Access & Security 1
Authentication, authorization, and security posture
Learn 3
Tutorials, courses, talks, and written guidance
Operate 2
Status, limits, changes, and where to get help
Commercial 1
Pricing, plans, and the legal terms of use
Company 4
The organization behind the API
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