steady-state operation is running a 📝fusion plasma continuously rather than in discrete pulses — the operating mode toward which practical power plants point, since a grid asset earns by producing without interruption.
Steady state is not merely a long pulse: a discharge with a record 📝pulse length still ends when its inductive flux runs out, while true steady-state operation has no built-in clock. The distinction matters because the 📝Tokamak is inherently pulsed — its 📝plasma current is driven by transformer action from the 📝central solenoid, which works only while the solenoid's field keeps changing. Reaching steady state in a tokamak therefore means replacing induction with 📝non-inductive current drive: radio-frequency waves, particle beams, and the self-generated 📝bootstrap current that a well-shaped pressure profile supplies on its own.
The 📝stellarator reaches the same goal by other means, twisting its confining field entirely with shaped external coils so that no plasma current is needed at all. For power plants the question is ultimately economic rather than absolute: a pulsed plant with long pulses, short dwell times between them, and components engineered for repeated thermal cycling can still sell electricity competitively, so the industry's practical target is a high duty cycle — with steady state as its limiting case.