We compare classical and quantum query complexities of total Boolean functions. It is known that for worst-case complexity, the gap between quantum and classical can be at most polynomial. We show that for average-case complexity under the uniform distribution, quantum algorithms can be exponentially faster than classical algorithms. Under non-uniform distributions the gap can even be super-exponential. We also prove some general bounds for average-case complexity and show that the average-case quantum complexity of MAJORITY under the uniform distribution is nearly quadratically better than the classical complexity. A preliminary version of this paper appeared in the Proceedings of the 17th Annual Symposium on Theoretical Aspects of Computer Science (STACS'2000) (Lecture Notes in Computer Science vol 1770) (Berlin: Springer).
Smoothed analysis is a central framework in classical algorithms for explaining the performance of algorithms beyond the worst case, often explaining why algorithms perform well in practice. We initiate a systematic study of its quantum counterpart and show the following results.
(1) We show that there is a total function whose smoothed quantum query complexity is exponentially smaller than its classical query complexity.
(2) We give near-tight characterizations of smoothed randomized and quantum query complexities for symmetric Boolean functions, unifying the worst-case complexity results of [Beals et al, FOCS'98] and average-case complexity results of [Ambainis and de Wolf, STACS'00].
(3) We study string problems such as pattern matching and edit distance and, in various regimes, give polynomial to superpolynomial quantum speedups. Our main technical ingredients include a near-tight quantum algorithm for
ε-approximating the number of collisions between two non-repetitive strings, improving the result of Le Gall and Ng [QIC'22]. Together, our results show that smoothing can reveal larger quantum speedups than worst-case analysis suggests, opening a path towards quantum advantage on more realistic inputs.
This paper considers the query complexity of the functions in the family F_{N,M} of N-variable Boolean functions with onset size M, i.e., the number of inputs for which the function value is 1, where 1<= M <= 2^{N}/2 is assumed without loss of generality because of the symmetry of function values, 0 and 1. Our main results are as follows: (1) There is a super-linear gap between the average-case and worst-case quantum query complexities over F_{N,M} for a certain range of M. (2) There is no super-linear gap between the average-case and worst-case randomized query complexities over F_{N,M} for every M. (3) For every M bounded by a polynomial in N, any function in F_{N,M} has quantum query complexity Theta (sqrt{N}). (4) For every M=O(2^{cN}) with an arbitrary large constant c<1, any function in F_{N,M} has randomized query complexity Omega (N).