Q Day is the moment in time — coming far sooner than later — when quantum computers become sufficiently mature at enough scale to crack the encryption algorithms that protect the majority of our data today. Cybersecurity authorities are warning that migration to quantum-resilient systems must begin now, given how quickly AI is advancing quantum capability.
By 2030, even today’s most robust encryption systems will be no match for quantum capabilities. This has profound implications for modern life as we know it. The safety of financial institutions and fiat and crypto currencies all face imminent risk. Government secrets, company IP, private health information – all could instantly be exposed. The World Economic Forum noted that “all regulations and laws regarding privacy, data management etc. would be impossible to uphold,” significantly eroding public trust.
Nothing that's encrypted with today's algorithms will be safe from quantum computers. It’s a sobering message that should, rightfully, stoke fear — and motivate action: Now is the time to protect yourself, your systems, and your data with quantum-resilient encryption. That starts with a baseline understanding of the power of quantum computing.
Quantum computing (and the QPUs it runs on) are significantly more powerful than the CPUs, GPUs, and NPUs of today's computers and data centers. That's because of how quantum computers work; they take advantage of quantum mechanics, probabilities, and superpositions at the atomic and subatomic level.
Think of this way: traditional computing relies on binary (a coin flip of 1 or 0, or classical bits); quantum computing is like flicking the coin so that it spins on end, with an incredible number of possible positions (qubits). This makes quantum computers especially good at solving certain problems and undertaking certain computations... including cracking encryption.
Until recently, quantum computing has been in the R&D phase. Why? Regardless of their technology — cryogenic superconductors, trapped-ion, or photonic — building large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computers is complicated and expensive. That means that only a handful of powerful nation-states (e.g., USA, China), major research universities, and major tech companies (IBM, Google) have been investing in its development.
But now commercial availability is sprinting ever closer. And with it, Q Day.
Q-Day refers to the point when quantum computers become powerful enough to break the encryption systems that safeguard today’s digital world.
Few sectors would be untouched once those defenses fall. Most secure systems — including banks, communications networks, and especially blockchains — rely on RSA and elliptic-curve encryption, both of which could be unraveled once quantum machines reach sufficient scale.
Among them, blockchain networks may face the steepest test, since their open, transparent design could make digital assets uniquely vulnerable once quantum decryption becomes possible. Q-Day could then upend the foundation of cryptocurrency security. Because blockchains rely on digital signatures, a powerful quantum computer could theoretically extract private keys from public ones, allowing hackers to seize funds.
Mati Greenspan, Founder of Quantum Economics, warned that when that day comes, “many blockchains won’t survive,” though he noted that some projects are already adapting for a post-quantum era — a shift he believes will “define the next era of digital ownership.”
An estimated 25 million Bitcoin addresses currently hold more than $100 in value, and Aixiv’s Quantum report estimates it could take six to twelve months to migrate those funds to quantum-safe wallets, according to research cited in Forbes.
And Q Day is coming sooner than later, with AI now accelerating its progress by helping researchers model and characterize the vast complexity of quantum systems. These AI models — spanning machine learning, deep learning, and transformer-based approaches — can approximate the state of massively complex quantum systems, allowing scientists to bypass the exponential scaling hurdles that have long limited quantum research.
By predicting physical properties like magnetization and entropy, AI tools act as surrogates that speed up testing, verification, and optimization of quantum hardware. This capability is vital for advancing quantum computing applications in encryption, materials discovery, and pharmaceuticals.
Because AI enables faster characterization and optimization, it shortens the timeline to practical quantum computing, effectively bringing Q-Day closer.
As recently as 2022, an estimate from experts in the field predicted an average of 15 years until Q day would hit — ie, 2037. Since then the date is pulling closer and closer to the present.
Expert forecasts on timing vary, but most agree it’s coming sooner than later. A 2025 analysis from PostQuantum projects a machine capable of breaking RSA-2048 by around 2030, give or take two years. Cybersecurity Ventures predicts that Y2Q will arrive on or around Jan. 1, 2031. An industry survey shows 61% of security professionals believe current encryption could be compromised within two years, and another 28% expect cracks within three to five years.
In other words, the runway to Q Day has been cut in half. We know this because of the key milestones that have already been hit. As described in Post Quantum analysis, these include:
That leaves one milestone yet to reach: cracking RSA-2048.
Q-Day would mean that most of the world’s existing encryption systems could be broken, rendering most common data security strategies instantly obsolete and threatening the security of the global digital economy.
Critical systems that depend on RSA security and elliptic-curve cryptography — such as financial transactions, blockchain operations, and secure communications — would be vulnerable to quantum decryption.
The arrival of quantum computers capable of this feat would undermine trust in digital systems and compromise sensitive data at every level, from individuals to governments, and across critical infrastructure sectors like transportation, food and ag, energy, and government and defense.
Cybersecurity authorities are advising organizations to move swiftly to invest in post-quantum encryption. For example, the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre advises migration to quantum-safe systems by 2028, with full adoption by 2035.
In the USA, a bipartisan bill has been proposed to ensure the federal government prepares for encryption-breaking quantum computers. Meanwhile the NSA has been warning for years about “harvest now, decrypt later” strategies, in which attackers capture encrypted data today with the expectation of decrypting it once quantum computing becomes powerful enough.
“The world will either suffer unimaginable financial, security, and technological catastrophes that taken together will be an order of magnitude worse than cybercrime, which is estimated to cost the world $10.5 trillion USD annually by 2025,” said Steve Morgan, editor-in-chief at Cybercrime Magazine of Q Day. “OR the world will be a much safer place.”
As AI accelerates quantum development, the timeline for safe reliance on today’s encryption methods is shrinking, creating pressure for early adoption of quantum-resilient standards.
SanQtum delivers that protection with new quantum-safe algorithms. The US National Institute of Standards and Technology has released Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) publications for three quantum-resistant cryptographic algorithms. Two of the standards (ML-KEM and ML-DSA) were developed by IBM Research cryptography researchers in Zurich with external collaborators, and the third (SLH-DSA) was co-developed by a scientist who has since joined IBM Research.
SanQtum provides zero-trust network architecture with quantum-resilient encryption, offered as a plug-and-play service so customers can scale rapidly. Our NIST-approved quantum-resilient encryption keeps your organization’s information secure — both data in transit and at rest — including against “harvest now, decrypt later” attacks and the dawn of Q Day.
Ready to prepare for Q Day? Let’s discuss how SanQtum can help defend your organization from the fast-approaching threat.
