Qubic - Deep Dive
How to get started with Qubic, and what makes it genuinely different - bare metal architecture, Useful Proof of Work, and a serious bet on emergent AI.
Qubic
Qubic is not trying to be another Ethereum. It is a fundamentally different bet on what decentralized computing and artificial intelligence should look like - built from bare metal up, with no virtual machine, no operating system, and a meritocratic consensus model where only the highest-performing nodes earn the right to validate the network.
Founded by Come-from-Beyond (Sergey Ivancheglo) - Bitcoin OG, NXT founder, IOTA co-founder - Qubic has been in development since before most current blockchains existed. The first mention of the Qubic name was in a 2012 blog post. The concept of Useful Proof of Work was written about in 2002.
This guide covers how to get started, and the ideas worth understanding before you do.
Get Started
Create a Wallet
Qubic uses a seed-based wallet system. Your 55-character seed is your account - there are no private key files or mnemonics in the traditional sense.
- Go to wallet.qubic.org
- Click Create Vault
- Generate and save your 55-character seed - this is your master key, store it offline
- Create a password and download the encrypted backup file
- Verify by re-uploading the backup and entering your password
Security note: Anyone with your seed controls your funds. No recovery exists without it. Write it down, store it offline, treat it like cash.
Where to Buy QUBIC
See the official exchanges list on qubic.org - kept up to date by the team.
Always withdraw to your own wallet after buying. Do not leave funds on exchanges.
Key Links
| Resource | Link |
|---|---|
| Wallet | wallet.qubic.org |
| Official site | qubic.org |
| Documentation | docs.qubic.org |
| Whitepaper | whitepaper.qubic.org |
| Explorer | explorer.qubic.org |
| Discord | discord.gg/qubic |
| GitHub | github.com/qubic |
What Makes Qubic Different
Bare Metal - No VM, No OS
Most blockchains run smart contracts inside a virtual machine (EVM, SVM, WASM). The VM adds security isolation but also overhead - every instruction passes through an abstraction layer before touching hardware.
Qubic eliminates that layer entirely. Smart contracts are written in C++ and execute directly on the hardware. Computor nodes boot via UEFI into RAM with no operating system. The Qubic software is the only thing running.
The consequence: CertiK independently verified 15.52 million TPS on live mainnet in April 2025. Smart contracts tested at over 55 million transfers per second in stress conditions. These are not theoretical benchmarks.
The trade-off: running a Computor node requires serious hardware - minimum 8 CPU cores, 2TB RAM, 1Gbps synchronous internet, NVMe storage, UEFI BIOS. This is deliberate. Low barrier to entry creates weak networks. Qubic's performance guarantees require committed infrastructure.
Smart Contracts
Contracts on Qubic are deployed through a governance process:
- The developer creates a contract in C++ and launches an IPO via Dutch auction - all QUBIC spent is permanently burned
- 451 of 676 Computors must vote to approve the contract before it deploys
- Once live, the contract runs feeless - execution is paid for by burning QUBIC as "energy," not fees paid to validators
This means no permissionless spam deployment, but also no gas fees for users once a contract is live.
Computors - Meritocracy by Mining
The 676 nodes that form Qubic's consensus layer are not selected by stake, election, or application. They are selected by weekly AI mining performance.
Every epoch (7 days), the top 676 nodes by Aigarth solution output earn Computor status. Poor performers are replaced. There is no staking requirement protecting incumbents. Up to 256 new Computors can ascend per epoch if they outperform the existing set.
Consensus requires 451 of 676 Computors to agree - approximately 2/3 + 1. Once quorum is reached within a tick (~5 seconds), finality is instant.
Useful Proof of Work
Bitcoin's PoW wastes electricity on arbitrary hash puzzles that serve no purpose beyond securing the network. Qubic's Useful Proof of Work directs that same computational energy toward training the Aigarth AI system - mining that produces something real.
The UPoW model was proven at scale in 2025 when Qubic directed its mining network toward Monero's blockchain, demonstrating that the coordination mechanism can move significant real-world hashpower. The Dogecoin mining integration (targeting April 2026) extends this further with ASIC miners running Scrypt in parallel alongside Aigarth CPU training.
Oracle Machines
As of February 2026, Qubic has native Oracle Machines running on mainnet - over 11,000 successful queries processed. Unlike Chainlink or Band Protocol, Qubic's oracles are built directly into the protocol: the same 676 Computors that validate transactions verify external data through quorum before it goes on-chain.
Price feeds from Binance, MEXC, and Gate.io are live. Smart contracts can subscribe to automatic data updates. No third-party oracle service required.
The AI Vision
Qubic's AI research team makes a pointed argument: large language models are sophisticated pattern matchers, not thinking systems. They retrieve statistically probable outputs from compressed training data. They cannot genuinely reason about things outside their training, cannot meaningfully say "I don't know," and do not have internal state that evolves over time.
Qubic's alternative approach, developed through Aigarth and Neuraxon, pursues intelligence that emerges through evolution rather than gradient descent:
- Aigarth - neural architectures compete and evolve through selection pressure (survival of the fittest configurations), running continuously on the Qubic network
- Neuraxon 2.0 (March 2026) - trinary neural units with excitatory, neutral, and inhibitory states (closer to biological neurons than binary perceptrons), continuous-time processing where state evolves in real time rather than resetting between training batches, and structural plasticity to avoid catastrophic forgetting
The goal is not a better chatbot. It is intelligence that exists in continuous time, develops internal state of its own, and adapts without losing what it already learned.
An IEEE academic paper on Neuraxon was submitted in March 2026.
Tokenomics
- Total supply: 200 trillion QUBIC (reduced from 1,000 trillion by community vote)
- Gross emission: 1 trillion QUBIC per epoch (weekly), fixed
- Burns: 55% of gross emission burned by the protocol each epoch (550B burned, 450B net) - post first halving, August 2025
- Halvings: Every 52 epochs (~1 year). Net emission halves at each one: was 850B pre-first halving, 450B now, ~212B after August 2026
- Additional burns: QUBIC spent on smart contract execution, oracle queries, and IPO auctions is permanently destroyed from circulating supply - separate from emission burns
- Transaction fees: None for end users - execution cost is covered by burning QUBIC as energy
What's Coming
| Milestone | Target |
|---|---|
| Dogecoin mining (ASIC) | April 2026 |
| Vottun Ethereum/Arbitrum bridge | Q1-Q2 2026 |
| Qubic-Solana bridge | 2026 |
| Second halving | August 2026 |
| AVX-512 only (dropping AVX2) | End of 2026 |
Mining & Running a Node
Setting up an Aigarth mining node requires bare metal hardware (no OS, UEFI boot) and some technical comfort. The process involves:
- Downloading the latest core release from github.com/qubic/core
- Configuring public nodes from the live network
- Compiling with Visual Studio Community (Windows)
- Creating a bootable USB with the required files
- Configuring UEFI network boot settings
For up-to-date node setup instructions, the official source is docs.qubic.org and the #mining channel in Discord. Hardware requirements and software versions change with each epoch update.
Learn More
- Blockchain Ecosystems → - How Qubic compares to other chains
- Token Evaluation → - Framework for evaluating any token
- Earn → - DeFi strategies and earning approaches
- qubic.org - Official site and blog
- docs.qubic.org - Technical documentation
Content current as of March 2026. Qubic is fast-moving - always verify current details at docs.qubic.org and the official Discord.