AI Indexes
IT AI Index
September 2026 Edition, published September 17, 2026 · The permanent record of that edition, superseded since. The current standing is on the category page →
Index › Identity and access › September 2026 Edition

Customer identity and access management

Asked as “customer identity platform”, and as “CIAM solution for a product's users”, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. 57 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing · first-choice share
21%
Contested · Auth0 18%
21Frontegg18Auth018Clerk44others

21% of first choices, contested.

By buyer segment

The same question asked on behalf of a different buyer. Each standing is computed within its segment; they sit side by side and are never added together.

The standing

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all twelve models, for a mid-market B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01Frontegg21%0%30accepted challenger
02Auth018%22%60accepted challenger
03Clerk18%3%31accepted challenger
04LoginRadius12%5%22accepted challenger
05Descope5%0%20accepted challenger
06FusionAuth5%5%22accepted challenger
07WorkOS4%0%19accepted challenger
08Microsoft Entra External ID4%23%39accepted challenger
09Keycloak4%18%17accepted challenger
10Firebase Authentication Lab in the set2%36%11criticized challenger
Show the four products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
14Okta0%50%20criticized challenger
13Amazon Cognito0%35%31criticized challenger
12Ping Identity0%24%29accepted challenger
11Stytch0%0%13accepted challenger
Bars are the share of first choices, 0 to 100Every product with at least 10 labels here. Every product name links to its product page.

Firebase Authentication is made by Google, whose model Gemini 3.5 Flash is in the set. On the four share prompts that model made it the first choice zero times of 4; the other eleven models one time of 44. Lab treatment is defined on the method page; the row is marked, not excluded.

All twenty-eight head-to-head pages: the top eight products, each against each

Recommended versus criticized

Every product with at least 10 labels here, on both axes. The 30% line names a quadrant, not the verdict above: that one needs more than 40%.

Criticized challengerCriticized default
Negative label rate →
01
02
03
04
05
06
07
08
09
10
11
12
13
14
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative40%
Key
01Frontegg21%
02Auth018%
03Clerk18%
04LoginRadius12%
05Descope5%
06FusionAuth5%
07WorkOS4%
08Microsoft Entra External ID4%
09Keycloak4%
10Firebase Authentication2%
11Stytch0%
12Ping Identity0%
13Amazon Cognito0%
14Okta0%

What they warned about

One of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.4 mini, Gemini 3.5 Flash, Perplexity Sonar, Grok 4.20, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, Kimi K2 and MiniMax M2.5 changed. A high negative share on a product with few labels is a warning. A low share on a product with many labels is salience, not sentiment.
Auth0
22%
13 of 60 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“Budget Trap to Avoid: Auth0 (Okta) ... it is **not recommended for companies on a limited budget**” Gemini 3.5 Flash, budget prompt
Okta
50%
10 of 20 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“many models advise small businesses to be cautious or avoid Okta for customer identity use cases due to complexity and cost” Mistral Small, negative prompt
Microsoft Entra External ID
23%
9 of 39 labels negative · 7 of 12 models · 5 hard negative
“**Azure AD B2C** if you need a broad, flexible CIAM platform... limited to **single-app external use cases**... **limited customization**” Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt
Amazon Cognito
35%
11 of 31 labels negative · 7 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“Avoid Cognito if your development team wants to move fast with modern, out-of-the-box UI components and smooth SDKs.” Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt

What they cite

Citations exist only for the models that return a source list: fourteen of the twelve in this edition, and all six flagship models on the expanded tier.

Sites the answers cite

78 of 84 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 14 of 12 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 1175 links across 261 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

39 answers · 54 citations · 11 models
36 answers · 61 citations · 11 models
vendor site · WorkOS31 answers · 43 citations · 12 models
30 answers · 30 citations · 11 models
29 answers · 32 citations · 11 models
28 answers · 50 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Guideflow27 answers · 27 citations · 9 models
vendor site · Descope25 answers · 30 citations · 8 models
vendor site · CyberPress23 answers · 32 citations · 10 models
vendor site · LoginRadius22 answers · 39 citations · 11 models
21 answers · 26 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Clerk16 answers · 30 citations · 8 models

Pages the answers cite

The ten pages named in the most answers, by full address. A page here is one the models returned with a recommendation, not one the index endorses.

Search against answers

Each company's standing in the answers beside its site's footprint in Google search, one row a site: the products the models named on it with their shares, and the share they add up to; monthly searches on Google, and DataForSEO's estimate of AI search demand (modeled from search signals, directional, not a count of queries to any assistant), for the most-searched of the company's and its products' names (the name is in each row's hover text); estimated monthly organic visits to the site; and its best position in Google's top ten for “best customer identity platform”, “customer identity platform”, “customer identity platforms”. US estimates from DataForSEO and Google's Ads Transparency Center. A small company's site, or a mid-sized company's site for its flagship, is marked company; a product on a large parent's site (Google, Microsoft) has no site figures. A column with no figures for this category is left out, and an empty cell means none were seen, not none exist. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.
Company and productsShareOwn site citedName searches, GoogleAI search demand, est.Organic visitsPaid search a month, est.Google ads, last 30 daysBest Google position
Frontegg frontegg.com21%97720419,06010
Auth0 auth0.com
Auth0 18%, Auth0/Okta Customer Identity Cloud 0%
18%23718,100772170,673117
Clerk clerk.com18%94110,00059,08246,22512
LoginRadius loginradius.com12%50170739,70931
WorkOS workos.com
WorkOS 4%, WorkOS AuthKit 4%
7%9912,10010733,47875
Descope descope.com5%642,4007919,633$19219
FusionAuth fusionauth.io5%501,3002144,19916
Microsoft parent site
Microsoft Entra External ID 4%
4%932,240,000403,136
Keycloak keycloak.org4%5412,1005898,582
Supabase Auth supabase.com4%241,9006291,4244

Google's top ten for the three searches hold 25 sites; 2 of them are among the sites the models cited here (loginradius.com, startwithidentity.com). The first result for “best customer identity platform” is reddit.com.

How they answered

Six framings of the same buying question, each sent to every model in a fresh session with search on. One row per model, so a row shows whether it held its answer under rewording, what it named when cost was the constraint, and what it argued against. Computed from the raw judge labels.
ShowHide
ModelDirect“What is the best customer identity platform for a mid-market B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which CIAM solution for a product's users would you recommend to a mid-sized B2B company?”Comparative“What are the top customer identity platforms and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best customer identity platform for a company with a limited budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 500 person company evaluating a customer identity platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which customer identity platforms should I avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5Descope, Frontegg
Three alternativesOneWelcome Identity Platform, SSOJet, WorkOS
no first choiceChangedno first choiceDescope
Two alternativesAuth0, Keycloak
no first choiceagainst: Auth0, JumpCloud, LoginRadius, Microsoft Entra, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta, Ping Identity
GPT-5.4 miniFrontegg
Three alternativesAuth0/Okta Customer Identity Cloud, FusionAuth, Okta
PingOne for B2BChanged
Two alternativesAuth0, Microsoft Entra External ID
against: Microsoft Entra External ID
Auth0
Five alternativesAmazon Cognito, Clerk, ForgeRock, Ping Identity, PingOne
FusionAuth
One alternativeSuperTokens
against: Auth0
no first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashWorkOS
Three alternativesClerk, Frontegg, Kinde
against: Auth0
FronteggChanged
Three alternativesAuth0, Clerk, WorkOS
no first choice
Six alternativesClerk, Descope, Frontegg, Supabase Auth, WorkOS, Zitadel
against: Auth0, Keycloak, Microsoft Entra External ID, Ping Identity
Supabase Auth
Four alternativesClerk, Keycloak, Kinde, Zitadel
against: Auth0
no first choiceagainst: Amazon Cognito, Microsoft Entra External IDagainst: Amazon Cognito, Firebase Authentication, ForgeRock, IBM Verify, Okta/Auth0, Oracle Identity Cloud, Ping Identity
Perplexity SonarLoginRadius
Three alternativesClerk, Frontegg, Microsoft Entra External ID
against: Auth0
LoginRadius, WorkOSChanged
Two alternativesAuth0, Frontegg
against: Okta
Auth0
Nine alternativesAmazon Cognito, Descope, ForgeRock, FusionAuth, Keycloak, Microsoft Entra External ID, Okta, Ping Identity, Stytch
Microsoft Entra External ID
One alternativeFusionAuth
against: Clerk
no first choiceagainst: Amazon Cognito, Keycloak, Klaviyo, Microsoft Entra External ID, Simon Data, Tealium, Twilio Segment, mParticle
Grok 4.20Auth0
Six alternativesClerk, Frontegg, FusionAuth, Microsoft Entra External ID, Stytch, WorkOS
FronteggChanged
Six alternativesAmazon Cognito, Auth0, Clerk, LoginRadius, Microsoft Entra External ID, WorkOS
no first choice
Seven alternativesAmazon Cognito, LoginRadius, Okta/Auth0, Ping Identity, Strivacity, Stytch, Transmit Security
Auth0, Clerk
Four alternativesAmazon Cognito, FusionAuth, Keycloak, Microsoft Entra External ID
against: Ping Identity
FusionAuth, LoginRadius
One alternativeAmazon Cognito
against: Amazon Cognito, Auth0, ForgeRock, Okta
Mistral SmallLoginRadius
One alternativeThales OneWelcome
against: Okta
Clerk, FronteggChanged
Three alternativesLoginRadius, Microsoft Entra External ID, Ping Identity
no first choiceAuth0
Two alternativesDescope, Okta
no first choiceagainst: Amazon Cognito, ForgeRock, Okta
DeepSeek V4 FlashAuth0, Frontegg
Three alternativesClerk, Microsoft Entra External ID, Stytch
FronteggChanged
One alternativeWorkOS
against: Auth0
Auth0
Seven alternativesAmazon Cognito, Descope, Frontegg, FusionAuth, Keycloak, Microsoft Entra External ID, Ping Identity
Clerk, Keycloak
Three alternativesAuth0, FusionAuth, SuperTokens
no first choiceagainst: Amazon Cognitoagainst: Amazon Cognito, Firebase Authentication, IBM Verify Identity / CIAM, Microsoft Entra External ID, Okta, Salesforce Identity / Salesforce Headless 360
Llama 4 MaverickLoginRadius
Two alternativesClerk, OneWelcome Identity Platform
no first choiceChangedAuth0
One alternativeMicrosoft Entra External ID
no first choiceno first choicenothing named
Qwen 3.7 FlashAuth0, Clerk
One alternativeMicrosoft Entra ID
against: Okta
FronteggChanged
One alternativeLoginRadius
against: Okta/Auth0
no first choice
Six alternativesIBM Verify, LoginRadius, Microsoft Entra External ID, Okta, Ping Identity, WorkOS
Firebase Authentication, Supabase Auth
Three alternativesClerk, Keycloak, SuperTokens
against: Auth0
Auth0
Two alternativesAmazon Cognito, Firebase Authentication
against: Keycloak
against: Amazon Cognito, Auth0, IBM Security IDM / Oracle Unified Directory, Microsoft Entra External ID, Microsoft Identity Manager, OneLogin, OpenAM, Ping Identity, Plivo, Stormpath
Kimi K2Clerk, Frontegg
Two alternativesFusionAuth, WorkOS
against: Amazon Cognito, Auth0
FronteggChanged
Three alternativesAuth0, Clerk, Stytch
Auth0
Four alternativesAmazon Cognito, LoginRadius, Microsoft Entra External ID, Ping Identity
Auth0, Clerk
Four alternativesFirebase Authentication, FusionAuth, Keycloak, Supabase Auth
against: Amazon Cognito
no first choice
Two alternativesDescope, Stytch
against: Auth0, FusionAuth
against: Amazon Cognito, Firebase Authentication, Okta/Auth0
GLM 4.7 FlashXAuth0
Four alternativesClerk, Descope, LoginRadius, Microsoft Entra External ID
Auth0Held
One alternativeMicrosoft Entra External ID
against: Ping Identity
Auth0
Three alternativesAmazon Cognito, Microsoft Entra External ID, Ping Identity
FusionAuth, Keycloak
Eight alternativesAuth0, Clerk, Descope, Firebase Authentication, Hanko, MojoAuth, Supabase Auth, WorkOS
no first choiceagainst: Auth0, ForgeRock, Okta, Ping Identity
MiniMax M2.5Auth0, Clerk
Two alternativesDescope, LoginRadius
Clerk, LoginRadiusChanged
Three alternativesFrontegg, Microsoft Entra External ID, PingOne for Customers
no first choice
Six alternativesAmazon Cognito, IBM Verify, LoginRadius, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta, Ping Identity
Clerk, Descope
One alternativeAuth0
no first choiceagainst: IDScan.net, Okta
Bold is the first choiceAlternatives are counted; the count opens them.What the answer argued against

The record

One row per call: the version string exactly as returned, whether the model searched, sources cited, and latency. Full answer text is in the free responses file. Download the record
Seventy-two rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
PromptModelVersion stringTime (UTC)SearchedSourcesLatency
Direct recommendationClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 08:41yes1610 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 13:36yes46 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:07yes2731 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 13:49yes224 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 11:45yes2116 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 13:47yes53 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 12:14yes2147 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 13:35yes52 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 10:03no026 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 12:00yes1425 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 10:49yes1865 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 10:09yes1015 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 08:50no04 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:39yes44 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:15yes917 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 12:19yes244 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 09:15yes208 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 12:47yes54 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 10:26yes2427 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 12:46yes53 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 09:56yes915 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 11:41yes1725 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 11:38yes24113 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 12:43yes739 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 09:47yes157 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 10:53yes48 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 12:42yes1825 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 11:37yes297 s
ComparativeGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 10:56yes228 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 09:15yes1512 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 08:37yes2127 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 13:31yes52 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 13:22yes1023 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 08:37yes1524 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 08:34yes2431 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 10:21yes1424 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 13:20yes188 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 13:41yes35 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 08:34yes2025 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 11:10yes225 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 08:29yes229 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 13:53yes155 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 10:10yes2522 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 12:00yes51 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 09:51yes2051 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 13:09yes2028 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 10:20yes25126 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 09:31yes513 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 12:31yes1710 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:06no09 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 07:49yes1126 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 12:40yes307 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 07:48yes198 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 13:41no010 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 08:28yes2435 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 12:35yes51 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 08:10no030 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 11:06yes2532 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 11:50yes1586 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 10:56yes525 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 11:46yes1810 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 11:21yes57 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 11:30yes1727 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 11:20yes235 s
Negative framingGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 08:34yes257 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 12:06yes53 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 08:04yes2228 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 08:18yes51 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 13:39no040 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 08:13yes2524 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 12:58yes2536 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 11:34yes1526 s

Noise floor in this category

Flips between the edition run and its calibration repeat. Six prompts per model is a small sample; the index-wide floor is the number to trust.

ShowHide
Claude Haiku 4.5
3 of 4 flipped
GPT-5.4 mini
3 of 4 flipped
Gemini 3.5 Flash
2 of 4 flipped
Perplexity Sonar
4 of 4 flipped
Grok 4.20
5 of 6 flipped
Mistral Small
2 of 3 flipped
DeepSeek V4 Flash
3 of 4 flipped
Llama 4 Maverick
2 of 3 flipped
Qwen 3.7 Flash
6 of 6 flipped
Kimi K2
4 of 5 flipped
GLM 4.7 FlashX
4 of 4 flipped
MiniMax M2.5
4 of 4 flipped

Normalization in this category

Every judgment call made between the raw labels and the numbers above, listed so it is visible and reversible.

ShowHide
Category-scoped readings
Ping read as Ping Identity
Unresolved, counted raw
IBM Security IDM / Oracle Unified Directory
IBM Verify Identity / CIAM
Klaviyo
OpenAM (ForgeRock)
Oracle Identity Cloud
Passage by 1Password
PingOne for B2B
PocketBase/Directus
Salesforce Identity / Salesforce Headless 360
Splink
Stormpath
Truss ID
Zingg
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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