# Secrets management for enterprise buyers: what AI models recommend, September 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, September 2026 Edition. Asked as "secrets management tool" and as "secrets vault for applications and infrastructure", six framings each, to twelve models with search on, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/identity/secrets-management/enterprise/

**Standing:** HashiCorp Vault leads with 75% of first choices; verdict clear leader. 40 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| # | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | HashiCorp Vault | 75% | 16% | 68 |
| 2 | Akeyless | 10% | 11% | 38 |
| 3 | Doppler | 5% | 27% | 41 |
| 4 | 1Password | 5% | 33% | 21 |
| 5 | AWS Secrets Manager | 2% | 31% | 52 |
| 6 | Infisical | 2% | 23% | 30 |
| 7 | CyberArk Conjur | 0% | 15% | 34 |
| 8 | Azure Key Vault | 0% | 31% | 49 |
| 9 | Google Secret Manager | 0% | 39% | 36 |

## Each model's first choice on the direct prompt

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Akeyless, HashiCorp Vault; alternatives CyberArk Conjur
- GPT-5.4 mini: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives AWS Secrets Manager, CyberArk Conjur
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Akeyless; alternatives AWS Secrets Manager, Infisical, OpenBao
- Perplexity Sonar: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives AWS Secrets Manager, Akeyless, Azure Key Vault, CyberArk
- Grok 4.1 Fast: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives AWS Secrets Manager, Azure Key Vault, CyberArk Conjur, Delinea Secret Server
- Mistral Small: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives 1Password, AWS Secrets Manager, Azure Key Vault, Google Secret Manager
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives AWS Secrets Manager, CyberArk Conjur, Doppler, Infisical
- Llama 4 Maverick: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives GitGuardian
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives Akeyless, Doppler
- Kimi K2: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives AWS Secrets Manager, Azure Key Vault, CyberArk Conjur
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives AWS Secrets Manager, Azure Key Vault, CyberArk Conjur, Doppler
- MiniMax M2.5: HashiCorp Vault; alternatives AWS Secrets Manager, Akeyless, Azure Key Vault, Google Secret Manager

## Sources the answers cite

64 of 72 answers came back with a source list, from 12 of 12 models. Sites named in the most answers:

- blog.gitguardian.com: 47 answers, 51 citations
- envmanager.com: 32 answers, 41 citations
- cycode.com: 28 answers, 30 citations
- doppler.com: 26 answers, 45 citations
- akeyless.io: 26 answers, 44 citations
- startwithidentity.com: 26 answers, 32 citations
- safeguard.sh: 25 answers, 28 citations
- guideflow.com: 25 answers, 26 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://blog.gitguardian.com/top-secrets-management-tools (46 answers)
- https://envmanager.com/blog/best-secrets-management-tools (32 answers)
- https://cycode.com/blog/best-secrets-management-tools (28 answers)
- https://guideflow.com/blog/secrets-management-software (25 answers)
- https://startwithidentity.com/rankings/best-secrets-management-tools (22 answers)
- https://safeguard.sh/resources/blog/best-secrets-management-and-vaulting-solutions (18 answers)
- https://costbench.com/best/secrets-management-for-enterprise (13 answers)
- https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Secrets_Management_Cheat_Sheet.html (12 answers)
- https://doppler.com/blog/secrets-management-tools-2025 (12 answers)
- https://akeyless.io/blog/best-secret-management-tools (11 answers)

## Warned against

- AWS Secrets Manager: 16 of 52 labels negative. "Avoid AWS Secrets Manager for your use case \u2014 the per-secret pricing ($0.40/month) becomes prohibitively expensive" (Kimi K2, budget prompt)
- Azure Key Vault: 15 of 49 labels negative. "Azure Key Vault also has operation-based pricing. That makes cost scale with workload and user activity, which is less predictable at large scale." (GPT-5.4 mini, budget prompt)
- Google Secret Manager: 14 of 36 labels negative. "such as AWS Secrets Manager, Azure Key Vault, and GCP Secret Manager as the *primary* store in a multi-cloud or hybrid enterprise" (Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt)
- Doppler: 11 of 41 labels negative. "Tools like Doppler ($21/user/month) ... become extremely costly at scale" (MiniMax M2.5, budget prompt)

## Record

- Method: https://it-ai-index.com/methodology/
- Raw judge labels and full responses: https://it-ai-index.com/data/
- License: CC BY 4.0. Cite as IT AI Recommendation Index, September 2026 Edition, it-ai-index.com.