Time Tagger Series - v2.18 Software Release!

| on 16 June 2025

Swabian Instruments is excited to share the new Time Tagger Software v 2.18. This update brings powerful new tools, better performance, and easier ways to collect and understand your data. It’s designed to help scientists working in fields like quantum optics, life sciences, and time-resolved measurements.

Virtual Channels in Time Tagger Lab

One of the most exciting new features is the ability to create Virtual Channels directly in the Time Tagger Lab software. With just a few clicks, you can set up channels for:

• Delayed signals (DelayedChannel)
• Coincidences (Coincidences)
• Gated measurements (GatedChannel)

These functionalities were previously only available through the API. Now, they’re integrated seamlessly into the graphical user interface, allowing real-time configuration - no code required.

Why This Matters

This is a game-changer for researchers in:

• Spontaneous parametric down-conversion (SPDC) sources characterization
• Quantum Key Distribution (QKD)
• Pump/Probe spectroscopy

With an intuitive UI, complex logic operations can be applied directly in the software. This significantly speeds up workflows.

Your Benefits

• Enables advanced experiments in just a few clicks
• Simplifies the configuration of DelayedChannel, Coincidences, GatedChannel.

Requirements & Comparison

There are no functional limitations for current processors, and more are expected in future versions. Time Tagger Lab offers full GUI-based real-time logic configuration, making it uniquely accessible.

Synchronizing Multiple Time Taggers

Time Tagger Software version 2.18 makes it easier than ever to connect multiple Time Taggers over a network. With the updated TimeTaggerNetwork, you can merge data from several devices - even in different locations - into one timeline. This means you can analyze events from remote setups as if they happened in the same place.

All you need is a shared timing reference, like a 10 MHz, and a 1 pulse-per-second (1PPS) signal. Our new ReferenceClock takes care of the rest.

Why This Matters

This is a game-changer for researchers working on:

• Distributed quantum optics experiments (Alice and Bob)
• Multi-room/multi-rack setups
• Telescope arrays separated by a very long baseline
• Metrology and telecom for synchronization monitoring

Your Benefits

• Real-time coincidence/correlation across remote locations
• No time-consuming post-processing steps
• Leverages Swabian’s low jitter capabilities across distances

Requirements & Comparison

In the old Time Tagger Software workflow, customers had to store and manually merge .ttbin files offline. With Time Tagger Software v2.18, the only requirement is that the host PCs must be synchronized to UTC within ±0.4 s.

The New ReferenceClock: Flexible and Precise

The updated ReferenceClock represents a breakthrough in timing flexibility, especially for users with non-standard timing sources.

Why This Matters

The traditional hardware phase-locked loop mechanisms imposed server limitations:

• Only narrow-band inputs (e.g. 10 MHz or 500 MHz) are allowed
• Incompatibility with pulsed lasers (e.g. 80 MHz), a common problem in biology
• Struggle with drifts or precise calibration

This new implementation (formerly SoftwareClock in v2.10) solves all of these issues! Here’s how:

1. Input any periodic signal to a regular hardware channel.
2. Sample events (e.g., keep 1 out of every 100).
3. Interpolate the rest into a virtual clock stream.
4. Tag detector events based on virtual timestamps.

This approach ensures high time accuracy, even with drifting or unconventional frequencies.

Your Benefits

• Works with minimum 100 kHz to maximum 700 MHz ( Time Tagger X) or 475 MHz (Time Tagger Ultra)
• Supports real-time correlation with pulsed lasers
• Avoids signal correlation artifacts
• Improves fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) and time resolved spectroscopy
• Expands use to quantum communication and biophysics
• Aligns the timebase of your Time Tagger to an absolute time reference to enable remote synchronization applications
• Compatible with ultra-stable clocks (e.g., metrology) and slightly drifting ones (e.g., satellite communication).
• Aligns smoothly with our EventDivider, transmitting only the important fraction of the data

Requirements & Comparison

Time Tagger Software v2.18 introduces a hardware-agnostic synchronization mechanism by expanding the flexibility of our SoftwareClock. To our knowledge, no competing solution offers this level of flexibility and integration in software-defined reference clocking. Most alternatives depend on fixed hardware inputs or basic external synchronization logic.

Expanded Channel Support for Time Tagger X and Ultra

This release brings two important hardware-related updates:

• Time Tagger X now supports up to 20 input channels with a new license option. Ideal for setups with many detectors or parallel inputs.
• The user experience with our Synchronizer tool has been improved for smoother handling and higher precision in multi-channel measurements.

These changes make it easier to scale up experiments or improve alignment precision.

New System and Device Support

The software now runs on more systems and devices:

• Official support for Debian 12, AlmaLinux 8 & 9
• Compatible with NumPy 2.0 on all Linux versions
• Can be used on a Raspberry Pi 4

This allows experiments to run on diverse platforms without a custom setup.

New Tutorials and Improved Documentation

To help you get started, we’ve updated all our tutorials and guides:

• A step-by-step guide to build a setup for Remote Synchronization
• A full walkthrough for Time Tagger Lab
• An in-depth guide to disclose the full functionality of the ReferenceClock
• Library documentation in your coding tool (Python & C++)

Thank You

Thank you to our users and partners who keep inspiring us to improve. Version 2.18 is just the beginning. We’re excited to bring even more flexibility, speed, and usability to your experiments.

Relevant topics