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Let $P_{\varphi }=|\varphi ⟩⟨\varphi |$. An arbitrary deterministic strategy, including auxiliary systems, intermediate measurements, adaptive actions and discarded records, is a quantum channel $\mathcal{E}$ from the two input qubits to the three returned qubits. Its output is $R_{\varphi }=\mathcal{E}(P_{\varphi }^{\otimes 2})$. The three local tests commute, and their joint all-pass projector is $P_{\varphi }^{\otimes 3}$. Thusis exactly the probability of at least one failed test. No independence of the three returned qubits is assumed.

We prove a uniform positive obstruction using trace distance, $D(\rho ,\sigma )=\Vert \rho -\sigma {\Vert }_1/2$. Two normalized pure kets obeyIndeed their projector difference is supported on their two-dimensional span, has trace zero, and has eigenvalues $\pm \sqrt{1-|⟨u|v⟩{|}^2}$.

Two further estimates will cover even mixed outputs. First, trace distance contracts under a quantum channel. To see this directly, the positive spectral projector of the trace-zero difference gives $D(\rho ,\sigma )={\max }_{0\le A\le I}\mathrm{Tr}[A(\rho -\sigma )]$. The adjoint of a channel is positive and unital, so it takes any output effect into an input effect. Maximizing over this subset cannot exceed the input maximum, proving contraction.

Second, for a mixed state $R={\sum }_j{q}_j|u_j⟩⟨u_j|$ and a pure target $P=|v⟩⟨v|$, the trace-norm triangle inequality and weighted Cauchy-Schwarz inequality give the pure-target upper bound on trace distance:In particular $D(R_{\varphi },P_{\varphi }^{\otimes 3})\le \sqrt{{ϵ}_{\varphi }}$.

Now take $|{\varphi }_0⟩=|0⟩$ and $|{\varphi }_1⟩=|+⟩=(|0⟩+|1⟩)/\sqrt{2}$. The two-copy input distance is $D_2=\sqrt{1-1/4}=\sqrt{3}/2$, whereas the ideal three-copy distance is $D_3=\sqrt{1-1/8}=\sqrt{7/8}$. Writing $R_j=R_{{\varphi }_j}$, contraction and the triangle inequality yieldLet $\delta =D_3-D_2>0$. Then $\sqrt{{ϵ}_0}+\sqrt{{ϵ}_1}\ge \delta$, and squaring givesThis is the copy-number trace-distance obstruction. It applies to every Bob strategy, irrespective of its internal complexity. If Alice chooses these two possible inputs with equal probabilities, the left side is her unconditional failure probability. For every device, at least one of the two inputs also has failure probability at least ${\delta }^2/4$, establishing the worst-case guarantee.

The same positive bound holds if Alice chooses a uniformly random pure-qubit state. Apply the preceding inequality to $U|0⟩$ and $U|+⟩$ for every single-qubit unitary $U$, since their overlap is unchanged. Average over normalized Haar measure. Both rotated kets have the same uniform distribution on the Bloch sphere, so each of the two average failures is the uniform-input average. Consequently that average is also at least ${\delta }^2/4$. A constant satisfying the strict requested inequality in either this average or the worst-case interpretation isThe proven bound is $2p$, hence strictly greater than $p$. This proof establishes a quantitative gap, rather than relying only on the impossibility of exact quantum cloning.

There is a necessary quantifier qualification because the PDF does not specify Alice's input distribution. A positive lower bound for every fixed state against every strategy would be false: a device hardwired to return $|000⟩$ never fails when the input is $|0{⟩}^{\otimes 2}$. The unknown-state assertion is therefore meaningful as a worst-case guarantee over possible inputs, or as an average for a specified hidden input ensemble. Both the equal-prior example and the uniform-input version have been proved here, with a constant independent of Bob's strategy.