A crucial component of photonic quantum information processing platforms is the ability to modulate, route, convert, and switch quantum states of light noiselessly with low insertion loss. For instance, a high-speed, low-loss optical switch is crucial for scaling quantum photonic systems that rely on measurement-based feed-forward approaches. Such a device will also ideally be capable of operating on photon-number states, which can act as non-Gaussian resources. Here, we demonstrate ultrafast all-optical switching of heralded photon-number states, of up to six photons, using the optical Kerr effect in a single-mode fiber. A local birefringence is created by a high-intensity pump pulse at a center wavelength of 1030 nm which overlaps temporally with the 1550 nm photons in the fiber. A switching efficiency of $>99\%$ is reached with a resolution of 2.3 ps, an insertion loss of $2.27\pm 0.08\mathrm{dB}$, and a signal-to-noise ratio of $32000$.

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• Kerr effect
• Quantum communication, protocols & technology
• Quantum information architectures & platforms
• Quantum information processing
• Ultrafast optics