IT AI Index
September 2026 Edition · The permanent record of this edition. The unqualified address always carries the latest edition.
Index › Identity and access › Workforce identity › Small business › September 2026 Edition

Workforce identity and SSO for small business buyers

Asked as “workforce identity platform”, and as “single sign-on and identity provider for employees”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 48 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing
JumpCloud
Clear leader
48% of first choices, clear leader.
ShowinginAll 67 categories in the September 2026 Edition →

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.
Small businessJumpCloud48%Clear leaderThis pageMid-marketMicrosoft Entra ID36%ContestedStanding →EnterpriseMicrosoft Entra ID47%Clear leaderStanding →

01The standing

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all twelve models, for a small B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01JumpCloud48%2%60endorsed leader
02Microsoft Entra ID35%6%64endorsed leader
03Okta6%44%41criticized challenger
04OneLogin2%6%36accepted challenger
05miniOrange2%5%20accepted challenger
Show the two products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
07Ping Identity0%75%16criticized challenger
06Okta Workforce Identity0%72%18criticized challenger
Bars are the share of first choices, 0 to 100Every product with at least 10 labels here. Every product name links to its vendor page.
Head to head
Microsoft Entra ID vs OktaMicrosoft Entra ID vs Okta Workforce IdentityOkta vs Okta Workforce Identity

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
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative60%
Key
01JumpCloud48%
02Microsoft Entra ID35%
03Okta6%
04OneLogin2%
05miniOrange2%
06Okta Workforce Identity0%
07Ping Identity0%

02What they warned about

Three of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.4 mini, Gemini 3.5 Flash, Perplexity Sonar, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Qwen 3.7 Flash, GLM 4.7 FlashX 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.
Okta
44%
18 of 41 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 3 hard negative
“Avoid Okta for tight budgets—it scales quickly in cost and is generally overkill for small businesses.” Kimi K2, budget prompt
Ping Identity
75%
12 of 16 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 5 hard negative
“Another enterprise-grade platform that's generally over-specced and over-priced for SMBs.” DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt
Okta Workforce Identity
72%
13 of 18 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“**Why cautious/avoid**: Premium per-user pricing ... Contract minimums punish small teams.” Grok 4.1 Fast, negative prompt
Saviynt
100%
6 of 6 labels negative · 6 of 12 models · 6 hard negative
“another governance-heavy enterprise platform that the SMB-focused roundup deliberately left out” Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt

03What they cite

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

Sites the answers cite

63 of 72 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 12 of 12 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 6 of those lists are Google grounding redirects that name no site and are left out of the counts. 842 links across 198 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

startwithidentity.com
50 answers · 131 citations · 10 models
corma.io
vendor site · Corma26 answers · 29 citations · 8 models
siit.io
vendor site · Siit23 answers · 32 citations · 7 models
techvendorindex.com
18 answers · 18 citations · 9 models
securityboulevard.com
16 answers · 20 citations · 8 models
okta.com
vendor site · Okta16 answers · 17 citations · 9 models
jumpcloud.com
vendor site · JumpCloud14 answers · 21 citations · 6 models
mspcompared.com
13 answers · 16 citations · 6 models
g2.com
12 answers · 30 citations · 7 models
tech-insider.org
12 answers · 12 citations · 7 models
guideflow.com
vendor site · Guideflow11 answers · 11 citations · 6 models
microsoft.com
vendor site · Microsoft10 answers · 14 citations · 6 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.

startwithidentity.com/rankings/best-iam-for-smb
45 answers · 10 models
startwithidentity.com/rankings/best-iam-platforms
32 answers · 9 models
startwithidentity.com/articles/top-6-workforce-identity-platforms
26 answers · 10 models
corma.io/blog/top-10-iam-solutions-for-smbs-and-mid-size-companies-2026
22 answers · 8 models
siit.io/blog/best-iam-tools
18 answers · 7 models
techvendorindex.com/compare/best-iam-for-small-business
16 answers · 9 models
securityboulevard.com/2025/12/top-12-identity-and-access-management-platforms
13 answers · 8 models
tech-insider.org/microsoft-entra-id-vs-okta-vs-auth0-2026
12 answers · 7 models
guideflow.com/blog/identity-access-management-software
11 answers · 6 models
frontegg.com/blog/top-sso-providers
10 answers · 8 models

04How 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.
ModelDirect“What is the best workforce identity platform for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which single sign-on and identity provider for employees would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top workforce identity platforms for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best workforce identity platform for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating a workforce identity platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which workforce identity platforms should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5no first choiceMicrosoft Entra IDChanged
Three alternativesGoogle Cloud Identity, Google Workspace, Okta
JumpCloud
Four alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta, OneLogin, miniOrange
JumpCloud
Three alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, OneLogin, miniOrange
against: Oktano first choiceagainst: CyberArk Identity, ForgeRock, Okta, Ping Identity
GPT-5.4 miniMicrosoft Entra ID
Two alternativesJumpCloud, Okta
OktaChanged
Four alternativesGoogle Cloud Identity, Google Workspace, JumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID
Microsoft Entra ID
Two alternativesJumpCloud, Rippling
Microsoft Entra ID
One alternativeJumpCloud
against: Oktano first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashJumpCloud
Three alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta, Rippling
Microsoft Entra IDChanged
Two alternativesGoogle Cloud Identity, JumpCloud
against: OktaJumpCloud
Three alternativesGoogle Workspace, Microsoft Entra ID, Rippling
against: Okta Workforce IdentityJumpCloud
Four alternativesAuthentik, Google Cloud Identity, Keycloak, Microsoft Entra ID
against: Okta, Ping IdentityJumpCloud
Three alternativesGoogle Workspace, Microsoft Entra ID, Rippling
against: Oktaagainst: CyberArk Identity, ForgeRock, Gluu, Keycloak, Okta, On-Premises Microsoft Active Directory, Ping Identity, SailPoint, Saviynt
Perplexity SonarJumpCloud
One alternativeMicrosoft Entra ID
against: OktaWorkOSChanged
Three alternativesJumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta
JumpCloud
Three alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta, OneLogin
Microsoft Entra ID, OneLogin
One alternativeJumpCloud
against: Oktano first choiceagainst: IBM ISAM, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta Workforce Identity, Oracle Identity Governance, Ping Identity, SailPoint IdentityIQ, Saviynt
Grok 4.1 FastJumpCloud
One alternativeMicrosoft Entra ID
against: Okta Workforce IdentityJumpCloudHeld
Two alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, OneLogin
against: Okta Workforce IdentityJumpCloud
Four alternativesGoogle Cloud Identity, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta Workforce Identity, OneLogin
JumpCloud
Four alternativesCisco Duo, Microsoft Entra ID, OneLogin, miniOrange
against: Okta Workforce IdentityJumpCloud
Three alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta Workforce, OneLogin
against: CyberArk Identity, Okta Workforce Identity, Ping Identity, SailPoint, Saviynt
Mistral SmallJumpCloud
Three alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta, miniOrange
Microsoft Entra ID, OktaChanged
Three alternativesJumpCloud, OneLogin, WorkOS
JumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID
One alternativeOneLogin
against: Okta Workforce Identity, Ping IdentityJumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID
Two alternativesOneLogin, miniOrange
against: Oktano first choiceagainst: IBM ISAM, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta, Oracle Identity Governance, SailPoint IdentityIQ, Saviynt
DeepSeek V4 FlashJumpCloud, Microsoft Entra IDagainst: Okta Workforce IdentityJumpCloudChanged
One alternativeMicrosoft Entra ID
against: Okta Workforce IdentityJumpCloud
Three alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta, OneLogin
JumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID
Two alternativesCisco Duo, Okta Workforce Identity
Microsoft Entra ID
Three alternativesGoogle Cloud Identity, JumpCloud, Okta
against: Ping Identityagainst: Akamai Identity Cloud, Azure AD B2B/B2C, Okta Workforce Identity, OneLogin, Ping Identity, SailPoint
Llama 4 Maverickno first choiceno first choiceHeldno first choiceJumpCloudno first choiceagainst: IBM ISAM, Okta, Oracle Identity Governance, SailPoint IdentityIQ, Saviynt
Qwen 3.7 FlashJumpCloud
Three alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta, OneLogin
Microsoft Entra IDChanged
One alternativeJumpCloud
against: OktaMicrosoft Entra ID
Three alternativesJumpCloud, Okta Workforce Identity, OneLogin
Cisco Duo, Microsoft Entra ID
Two alternativesJumpCloud, miniOrange
Google Cloud Identity, Microsoft Entra ID
Two alternativesJumpCloud, OneLogin
against: ForgeRock, Okta, Ping Identityagainst: CyberArk Identity, Ping Identity, SailPoint
Kimi K2JumpCloud
Two alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, OneLogin
JumpCloudHeld
Two alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta
JumpCloud
Two alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, OneLogin
against: Okta Workforce IdentityJumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID
Two alternativesGoogle Workspace, Keycloak
against: OktaJumpCloud
Two alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta
against: CyberArk Identity, Google Cloud IAM, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta, SailPoint, Saviynt
GLM 4.7 FlashXJumpCloud
Four alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta, OneLogin, miniOrange
Microsoft Entra ID, OktaChanged
Two alternativesJumpCloud, OneLogin
JumpCloud
Four alternativesMicrosoft Entra ID, Okta Workforce Identity, OneLogin, miniOrange
against: CyberArk IdentityJumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID
One alternativeCisco Duo
against: Okta Workforce Identityno first choiceagainst: Auth0/Okta Customer Identity Cloud, Authelia, CyberArk Identity, Deel IT, Keycloak, LoginRadius, Okta, Ping Identity, Zitadelagainst: CyberArk Identity, ForgeRock, JumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID, Okta, OneLogin, OpenIAM, Ping Identity, miniOrange
MiniMax M2.5JumpCloud
Three alternativesOkta Workforce Identity, OneLogin, SSOJet
Microsoft Entra IDChanged
Two alternativesGoogle Cloud Identity, JumpCloud
against: Okta Workforce Identityno first choiceminiOrange
Three alternativesJumpCloud, Microsoft Entra ID, OneLogin
no first choiceagainst: IBM ISAM, Oracle Identity Governance, SailPoint IdentityIQ / Identity Security Cloud, Saviynt Identity Cloud
Bold is the first choiceAlternatives are counted; the count opens them.What the answer argued against

05The 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-4-5-202510012026-09-17 08:27no04 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 09:08yes36 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 08:44yes1426 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 09:10yes204 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 08:57yes4417 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 08:36yes54 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 08:51yes1314 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 08:45yes52 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 08:27yes537 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 08:18yes1327 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 08:47yes734 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 08:36yes1221 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 08:39no05 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 08:54no03 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 08:45yes523 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 08:22yes205 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 08:38yes4115 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 08:18yes107 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 09:10yes1822 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 08:40yes53 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 08:49yes1072 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 08:43yes1344 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 08:45yes1527 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 08:52yes539 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 09:07yes98 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 08:44yes67 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 08:34yes2129 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 08:33yes197 s
ComparativeGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 08:38yes3516 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 09:09yes58 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 08:17yes1619 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 08:48yes52 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 08:45yes530 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 09:10yes3041 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 08:27yes940 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 08:36yes2353 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 08:32yes97 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 08:50no03 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 08:32yes1421 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 08:23yes205 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 08:27yes4315 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 08:29yes54 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 08:39yes1212 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 08:56yes52 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 08:49yes534 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 08:21yes1017 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 08:45yes1515 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 08:27yes1028 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 08:31no06 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 08:16no07 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 09:02yes1123 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 08:17yes207 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 08:31yes1912 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 08:56no07 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 08:58yes1015 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 08:29yes54 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 08:29no037 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 08:40yes1021 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 08:17yes1561 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 08:43yes516 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 09:05yes2413 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 08:22no07 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 08:30yes2424 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 08:19yes207 s
Negative framingGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 08:29yes2113 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 09:06yes56 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 08:59yes2927 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 08:51yes53 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 08:18yes1048 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 09:10yes2845 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 08:41yes4492 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 08:18yes1230 s

Normalization in this category

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

Category-scoped readings
CyberArk read as CyberArk Identity
Microsoft Entra read as Microsoft Entra ID
Microsoft Entra (formerly Azure AD) read as Microsoft Entra ID
Ping read as Ping Identity
Unresolved, counted raw
Azure AD B2B/B2C
FoxIDs
On-Premises Microsoft Active Directory (AD)
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.

Also in identity and access

The other categories of this function, with the leader in each.
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