Quantum circuits that work perfectly in simulators often produce unexpected results on real quantum hardware due to quantum noise — including decoherence, gate errors, measurement errors, and idle errors. Using Qiskit Aer, developers can reproduce these hardware imperfections locally by building custom noise models with depolarizing errors. The post explains the difference between error mitigation (correcting results after execution) and error suppression (reducing errors during execution), with a focus on dynamical decoupling as a key suppression technique. It also introduces Orbit, a Qiskit Function from Quantum Elements that automates error suppression for IBM Quantum workflows, allowing developers to get more reliable results without manually tuning circuits for hardware characteristics.
