Noise and Drift Budgets for Scaling Quantum Devices

Quantum devices across a range of applications force experimenters to compensate for noise-induced drift costing valuable measurement time. Usually, compensation routines are performed at regular intervals though doing so means that corrections can be run too late. We present a simple analysis of noise which characterizes drift and can be used to predict compensation timing in specific use cases. We compare this statistic with other choices and provide illustrative examples of its use in the context of realizing the Ampere through single-electron devices and qubit gate fidelity and integration limits.