D-Wave vs. Quantum Computing: Which Stock is Truly Worth the Hype?

Quantum stocks are attracting investor attention in 2025, and two of the most talked-about names are D-Wave Quantum QBTS and Quantum Computing, Inc. QUBT. While both trade in the speculative, high-innovation corner of the market, D-Wave is focused on scaling its commercial quantum annealing systems. QUBT, on the other hand, is pursuing a photonics-driven future with early-stage chip and software initiatives. With both stocks exhibiting sharp price swings and outsized long-term potential, the question is which name offers more tangible progress and which is still searching for its identity? Let’s find out.

The Case for QBTS

Rapid Commercial Adoption Backed by Real-World Use Cases and System Sales: D-Wave is seeing accelerating commercial traction, with the company highlighting multiple real-world deployments and system sales across industries and regions. The company secured a €10 million Advantage2 system contract in Italy, including five years of capacity and an option for a full system purchase. It has also deployed an Advantage2 system at Davidson Technologies to support U.S. defense and aerospace work.

Its customer roster continues to expand, adding a major U.S. airline, SkyWater, Japan Tobacco Pharma, Yapi Kredi, BASF and North Wales Police, thus contributing to a base of more than 100 revenue-generating customers, including roughly two dozen Global 2000 firms. These engagements are producing measurable outcomes such as cutting BASF’s scheduling time from 10 hours to seconds and reducing emergency response times by nearly 50% for North Wales Police, demonstrating practical value.

Management emphasizes that, unlike competitors still focused on research, D-Wave is already delivering production-ready quantum solutions, which it views as a major driver of bookings, revenue momentum and market credibility.

Strong Financial Position: D-Wave’s financial position has strengthened markedly, with the company recently highlighting major improvements, driven by high-margin system revenues and a more favorable revenue mix. Third-quarter revenues doubled year over year to $3.7 million, and system-related sales, such as upgrades at Julich, pushed GAAP gross margin to 71.4% and non-GAAP gross margin to 77.7%. Year-to-date GAAP gross margin climbed to 84.8% from 62.7% a year earlier. The company’s cash balance surged to $836.2 million, up from just $29.3 million in the prior year, and additional warrant-exercise proceeds after the quarter provided even more liquidity.

Management emphasized that this strengthened balance sheet supports ongoing development across both annealing and gate-model quantum programs, enables potential M&A activity, and may help position D-Wave to become the first independent quantum computing company to achieve sustained profitability.

Stumbling Block

Higher Operating Expenses and Significant Non-Cash Warrant-Related Charges: Despite stronger revenue and margins, D-Wave continues to report substantial losses primarily due to high operating costs. Third-quarter net loss rose to $140.8 million from $22.7 million, largely due to $121.9 million in non-cash warrant charges. Adjusted EBITDA loss increased to $20.6 million from $13.8 million in the third quarter. Nine months adjusted EBITDA loss widened to $46.7 million from $40.6 million.

Two Major Growth Factors for QUBT

Strong Capital Raises: QUBT’s most significant growth driver is its dramatically strengthened balance sheet. In 2025, the company raised over $1.5 billion, including $500 million in the third quarter and another $750 million afterward, giving it the resources to accelerate its engineering, manufacturing and commercialization plans. Management stresses that this capital is critical for executing its roadmap, moving from prototypes and small-batch output to higher-volume production by the end of the decade. The cash also supports team expansion, facility build-out, and strategic investments such as developing Fab 2, which is intended to scale thin-film lithium niobate (TFLN) chip manufacturing for telecom, quantum information, sensing and AI-driven applications.

Increasing Commercial Momentum Across Government, Enterprise and Research Sectors: QUBT’s third-quarter results show increasing real-world adoption of QUBT’s photonic and quantum systems. Revenues grew to $384,000 on higher R&D and custom hardware contracts, along with initial DIRAC-3 cloud access revenues. The NASA LiDAR project demonstrated DIRAC-3’s value in government and scientific applications, while commercial traction included the prior EmuCore sale to a global automaker and a new engagement with a major U.S. financial institution. Fab 1 is already producing TFLN chips for early customers, supporting active programs across research, government and industry. Rising inbound interest and the company’s room-temperature, low-SWaP-C photonic platform further strengthen its competitive position as use cases broaden.

Yet Downside Remains

Rapidly Rising Operating Expenses: A major challenge is QUBT’s rapidly rising operating expenses. Third-quarter operating costs nearly doubled to $10.5 million, impacted by broad hiring and expansion across R&D, engineering, manufacturing, sales and administration. Management expects SG&A to keep rising as the company scales, which could widen operating losses if revenues don’t accelerate.

QBTS Outperforms QUBT and Benchmark in 6 Months

Over the past six months, shares of D-Wave have surged 27.7%, handily outperforming QUBT stock’s 10.4% decline and the S&P 500’s 17.8% rally.

Average Target Price for QUBT Suggests a Better Upside

Based on short-term price targets offered by 10 analysts, QBTS’ average price target represents an increase of 64.7% from the last closing price of $22.59.

Based on short-term price targets offered by three analysts, QUBT’s average price target represents an increase of 104% from the last closing price of $11.60.

Conclusion

In conclusion, while both QBTS and QUBT have a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold), D-Wave stands out as the stronger long-term opportunity for investors seeking a commercially validated quantum pure play. QBTS is already deploying production-ready systems across enterprise, government and research markets, showing real performance gains and building a customer base of more than 100 organizations. QUBT, meanwhile, remains an early-stage player with substantial capital backing and promising photonics technology, but its path to scaled commercialization is still developing, making QBTS the more compelling near- and long-term pick for quantum-focused investors today. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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