Florida Qiskit Fallfest Hackathon

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Step 02 of 12 · 40 min

Account and tools

Create your own IBM Quantum Platform account, your own Open Plan instance, and your own API key. This site never collects passwords, API keys, or CRNs.

Your own account

Checked against IBM’s plans and cloud-setup guides on 2026-09-26. If a screen disagrees with this list, follow the guide.

Participants create their own accounts. There is no shared login. Sign in with an IBMid or a Google account. Those login credentials are not the same thing as an API key.

Create the Open Plan instance in us-east. You can see only the instances in the region you are logged into. The Open Plan is up to 10 minutes of QPU execution time per rolling 28-day window. Simulators first. Read the current limit at https://quantum.cloud.ibm.com/docs/en/guides/max-execution-time (opens in a new tab). The Bell lab starts on a local simulator and does not spend that window.

  1. Open IBM Quantum Platform and create your own account if you need one.
  2. Sign in. Confirm the account name in the header.
  3. Create the Open Plan instance in us-east.
  4. Copy the instance CRN into a private note. The examples below keep the CRN as a placeholder.
  5. Generate an API key on a machine you trust. It may be shown only once. Save it privately.
  6. Confirm access without showing the secret: open Composer and check that qubit wires appear. Do not screenshot the key or the CRN.
  7. If a key is exposed, revoke it in the dashboard and create a replacement. The old key stops working. Do not paste either key here.

Protect the key

On a trusted personal computer you may save the account locally with the snippet below. Replace the placeholders on your machine. Do not commit the filled cell.

On a lab machine, a public notebook, or a projected screen, do not call save_account(). Use IBM’s untrusted-environment guide, and revoke the key after the session when that is appropriate.

If something fails

A workshop facilitator is the instructor, co-host, or designated university lead helping participants during the session. If you cannot sign in after trying the account troubleshooting steps, ask a workshop facilitator or your university lead for help. You can continue following the projected demonstration while the account issue is being resolved. Do not create a second account until you know which email you already used.

Ask your local university lead first, then the workshop instructor or designated co-host, then Kevin Robinson at kevin@quantumglobalgroup.io for unresolved program questions. Do not send basic account troubleshooting to IBM unless official IBM account support is required.

Confirmation email missing

What may have happened: the message is in spam, or it is still on its way. Check spam, wait, and resend once. Ask a workshop facilitator if it still does not arrive. You can keep following the projected demonstration while you wait.

A different account or region

What may have happened: the header is on another region, so the Open Plan instance stays hidden. Open Plan instances live in us-east. Switch the header, then read the account name. A facilitator can look with you. The Bell lab can run on the simulator in the meantime.

Open Plan not visible

What may have happened: the region or the signed-in account is not the one that holds the plan. Confirm both. Ask your university lead if it is still missing. The Bell lab can still run on the simulator while that is resolved.

Composer does not load

What may have happened: the page stalled, or the browser is an older one. Refresh once. Current Chrome, Edge, or Firefox usually load it. Tell a facilitator if it still does not. The Python lab on the next pages can wait, and you can keep reading the circuit here.

Save the Open Plan account on a trusted computer
from qiskit_ibm_runtime import QiskitRuntimeService

QiskitRuntimeService.save_account(
    token="<YOUR_PRIVATE_API_KEY>",
    instance="<YOUR_OPEN_PLAN_CRN>",
    name="open-plan",
    set_as_default=True,
    overwrite=True
)
Where do the API key and the CRN belong?

Choose one answer when you are ready. This is practice.

Learn the words this circuit uses