IT AI Index
September 2026 Edition · The permanent record of this edition. The unqualified address always carries the latest edition.
Index › Data platform › Orchestration › Enterprise › September 2026 Edition

Workflow orchestration for enterprise buyers

Asked as “workflow orchestration tool”, and as “data pipeline orchestrator”, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. 49 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing
Apache Airflow
Contested
29% of first choices, contested.
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 businessPrefect23%ContestedStanding →Mid-marketPrefect24%ContestedStanding →EnterpriseApache Airflow29%ContestedThis page

01The standing

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all twelve models, for an enterprise B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01Apache Airflow29%22%46accepted challenger
02Astronomer Astro10%18%17accepted challenger
03Camunda8%11%28accepted challenger
04Temporal8%18%34accepted challenger
05Prefect6%22%40accepted challenger
06Microsoft Power Automate6%36%14criticized challenger
07Dagster2%14%35accepted challenger
08Workato2%27%22criticized challenger
09Pega2%29%14criticized challenger
10ServiceNow2%36%22criticized challenger
11BMC Control-M2%31%16criticized challenger
12n8n2%43%14criticized challenger
Show the four products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
16Zapier0%70%20criticized challenger
15Make0%69%13criticized challenger
14AWS Step Functions0%50%18criticized challenger
13Appian0%23%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 vendor page.
Head to head
Prefect vs DagsterPrefect vs Apache AirflowDagster vs Apache Airflow

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
B11
12
13
14
15
16
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative40%
Key
01Apache Airflow29%
02Astronomer Astro10%
03Camunda8%
04Temporal8%
05Prefect6%
06Microsoft Power Automate6%
07Dagster2%
08Workato2%
09Pega2%
10ServiceNow2%
11BMC Control-M2%
12n8n2%
13Appian0%
14AWS Step Functions0%
15Make0%
16Zapier0%

02What they warned about

Two of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Gemini 3.5 Flash, Perplexity Sonar, Grok 4.1 Fast, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, Kimi K2, 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.
Zapier
70%
14 of 20 labels negative · 10 of 12 models · 10 hard negative
“they become dangerous liabilities as an organization scales... Migrating off a web of interconnected Zapier Zaps is notoriously difficult” Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt
AWS Step Functions
50%
9 of 18 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 3 hard negative
“you generally want to avoid "Pay-Per-Step" pricing (like AWS Step Functions or Cloud Workflows), as costs spike uncontrollably” Qwen 3.7 Flash, budget prompt
Apache Airflow
22%
10 of 46 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“Tools to **Avoid or Be Highly Cautious About**: 1. **Apache Airflow (especially self-managed)**... **When to avoid**: If you don't have a dedicated platform engineering team” Grok 4.1 Fast, negative prompt
Make
69%
9 of 13 labels negative · 7 of 12 models · 7 hard negative
“such as **Zapier, Make, n8n, Pipefy, Kissflow, and Nintex** when the enterprise needs deep integration” 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

66 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. 5 of those lists are Google grounding redirects that name no site and are left out of the counts. 929 links across 286 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

elementum.ai
vendor site · Elementum38 answers · 41 citations · 10 models
zapier.com
vendor site · Zapier29 answers · 32 citations · 9 models
reddit.com
25 answers · 30 citations · 9 models
betasystems.com
21 answers · 28 citations · 10 models
enate.io
vendor site · Enate21 answers · 22 citations · 10 models
getorchestra.io
20 answers · 27 citations · 10 models
teamwork.com
vendor site · Teamwork.com20 answers · 20 citations · 9 models
wrike.com
vendor site · Wrike19 answers · 19 citations · 9 models
thedigitalprojectmanager.com
14 answers · 15 citations · 9 models
prefect.io
vendor site · Prefect12 answers · 20 citations · 6 models
unmeshed.io
vendor site · Unmeshed12 answers · 12 citations · 8 models
devopsschool.com
11 answers · 12 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.

elementum.ai/blog/best-workflow-orchestration-tools
37 answers · 10 models
zapier.com/blog/workflow-orchestration-tools
23 answers · 9 models
enate.io/blog/workflow-orchestration-tools
20 answers · 10 models
teamwork.com/blog/workflow-orchestration-tools
20 answers · 9 models
betasystems.com/resources/blog/enterprise-workflow-tools
19 answers · 10 models
reddit.com/r/ITManagers/comments/1soh54t/enterprise_workflow_orchestration_…
19 answers · 9 models
wrike.com/workflow-guide/workflow-orchestration-tools
19 answers · 9 models
thedigitalprojectmanager.com/tools/workflow-orchestration-tools
14 answers · 9 models
unmeshed.io/blog/workflow-orchestration-tools-2026
12 answers · 8 models
kanerika.com/blogs/workflow-orchestration-tools
11 answers · 9 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 workflow orchestration tool for an enterprise B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which data pipeline orchestrator would you recommend to a large B2B company with thousands of employees?”Comparative“What are the top enterprise-grade workflow orchestration tools and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best workflow orchestration tool for a large company that needs predictable total cost across thousands of users?”Scale-constrained“We are a 5,000 person company with SSO, SOC 2 and procurement review requirements evaluating a workflow orchestration tool. What should we look at?”Negative“Which workflow orchestration tools should a large enterprise avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5Apache Airflow
Two alternativesPrefect, Temporal
against: ZapierApache AirflowHeld
Four alternativesAstronomer Astro, Azure Data Factory, Dagster, Informatica
no first choicePega
Three alternativesAppian, Camunda, ServiceNow
no first choiceagainst: AWS Step Functions, Enate, Google Cloud Workflows, Orkes, Zapier
GPT-5.4 miniApache Airflow
One alternativeTemporal
Apache AirflowHeld
Two alternativesDagster, Prefect
no first choiceApache Airflow
One alternativeTemporal
against: Dagster, Prefectno first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashTemporal
Seven alternativesAWS Step Functions, Apache Airflow, Camunda, Dagster, Make, Prefect, Workato
DagsterChanged
Four alternativesApache Airflow, Astronomer Astro, Kestra, Prefect
no first choicen8n
Four alternativesActivepieces, Apache Airflow, Camunda, Temporal
against: MuleSoft Anypoint Platform, Tray.io, Workato, ZapierAstronomer Astro
Three alternativesDagster, Prefect, Temporal
against: Apache Airflowagainst: AWS Step Functions, Apache Airflow, Apache Oozie, Appian, IBM Business Automation Workflow, Kubeflow Pipelines, Luigi, Make, Pega, Ray Workflows, Zapier
Perplexity SonarWorkato
Seven alternativesAppian, Camunda, Enate, Next Matter, Pega, ServiceNow, Temporal
Astronomer AstroChanged
Four alternativesDagster, Informatica, MuleSoft Anypoint Platform, Prefect
no first choiceCamunda
One alternativeTemporal
against: Appian, Microsoft Power Automate, Pega, ServiceNowno first choiceagainst: AWS Step Functions, Apache Airflow, Appian, Dagster, Google Cloud Workflows, IBM Business Automation Workflow, Kissflow, Make, Nintex, Pega, Pipefy, Prefect, ServiceNow, Zapier, n8n
Grok 4.1 FastApache Airflow, ServiceNow
Five alternativesBMC Control-M, Dagster, Pega, Prefect, Workato
against: Broadcom AutomicApache AirflowChanged
Four alternativesAmazon Managed Workflows for Apache Airflow, Astronomer Astro, Dagster, Google Cloud Composer
against: Databricks Lakeflow Jobs, PrefectApache Airflow
Five alternativesBMC Control-M, Dagster, IBM Workload Automation, Prefect, Stonebranch Universal Automation Center
BMC Control-M
Two alternativesActiveBatch, Stonebranch
against: Apache Airflow, Argo, Astronomer Astro, Camunda, Dagster, Microsoft Power Automate, Prefect, Temporal, WorkatoJinba Flow
Three alternativesApache Airflow, BMC Control-M, Zapier
against: Amazon Managed Workflows for Apache Airflow, Apache Airflow, Astronomer Astro, Dagster, Make, Prefect, Zapier, n8n
Mistral SmallEnate, Next Matter
One alternativeWorkato
Apache AirflowChanged
Four alternativesAWS Step Functions, Astronomer Astro, Dagster, Prefect
no first choice
Six alternativesApache Airflow, Argo Workflows, Camunda, Prefect, Temporal, Workato
Frendsagainst: BMC Control-M, Broadcom Automic/AutoSys, MuleSoft Anypoint Platform, Workatono first choiceagainst: Apache Airflowagainst: ServiceNow
DeepSeek V4 FlashCamunda
Three alternativesApache Airflow, Temporal, Workato
Apache Airflow, Astronomer AstroChanged
Three alternativesAzure Data Factory, Dagster, Databricks Lakeflow Jobs
against: PrefectApache Airflow
Six alternativesArgo Workflows, Camunda, Dagster, Flyte, Prefect, Temporal
against: AWS Step FunctionsWrike
Two alternativesSmartsheet, monday service
against: AWS Step Functions, Google Cloud Workflows, Make, Prefect, ServiceNow, Temporal, Zapierno first choiceagainst: Apache Airflow, Camunda, Make, ServiceNow, Zapier, n8n
Llama 4 MaverickEnate, Next Matterno first choiceChangedno first choiceno first choiceno first choiceagainst: AWS Step Functions, Make, Temporal, Zapier, n8n
Qwen 3.7 FlashApache Airflow, Temporal
Five alternativesAmazon Managed Workflows for Apache Airflow, Dagster, Databricks Lakeflow Jobs, Prefect, n8n
Apache Airflow, Astronomer AstroChanged
Five alternativesAWS Step Functions, Azure Data Factory, BMC Control-M, Dagster, Google Cloud Composer
Appian, ServiceNow
Three alternativesApache Airflow, Pega, RunMyJobs
against: Broadcom Automic/AutoSys, Microsoft Power AutomateMicrosoft Power Automate, Prefect
Two alternativesDagster, Workato
against: AWS Step Functions, Google Cloud Workflows, Make, Zapierno first choiceagainst: Apache Airflow, Apache NiFi, Make, ServiceNow, Temporal/Open Web UI, Workato, Zapier, n8n
Kimi K2Camunda, Temporal
Three alternativesAWS Step Functions, Apache Airflow, Workato
Apache Airflow, Astronomer AstroChanged
Two alternativesDagster, Prefect
no first choiceagainst: BMC Control-M, Broadcom Automic/AutoSysMicrosoft Power Automate, NITRO Studio
Five alternativesApache Airflow, Camunda, Dagster, NetApp Instaclustr for Cadence, Prefect
against: AWS Step Functions, Astronomer Astro, Automation Anywhere, Copilot Studio, Salesforce Agentforce, Temporal, UiPathPrefect
Three alternativesCamunda, Elementum, Tonkean
against: Apache Airflow, BMC Control-M, Broadcom Automic/AutoSys, CA-7, Microsoft Power Automate, Salesforce Agentforce, ServiceNow, Zapier
GLM 4.7 FlashXCamunda, Temporal
Four alternativesApache Airflow, Enate, Prefect, Stonebranch
Apache AirflowChanged
Two alternativesAstronomer Astro, Dagster
against: Prefectno first choice
Six alternativesApache Airflow, Appian, Microsoft Power Automate, Pega, ServiceNow, Workato
against: BMC Control-MPrefect
Two alternativesApache Airflow, Microsoft Power Automate
against: Temporal, Workatono first choiceagainst: AWS Step Functions, Argo Workflows, Bizagi, Camunda, Kubeflow, Make, Microsoft Power Automate, Orchest, Pega, Workato, Zapier, n8n
MiniMax M2.5Enate, Next Matter
Two alternativesMicrosoft Power Automate, Workato
Apache AirflowChanged
One alternativeDagster
no first choice
Five alternativesAstronomer Astro, Camunda, Kestra, ServiceNow, Temporal
Microsoft Power Automate
Three alternativesApache Airflow, Camunda, n8n
no first choice
Three alternativesJinba, Prefect, Zapier
against: Temporalagainst: Apache Airflow, BMC Control-M, Broadcom Automic/AutoSys, Cflow, Dagster, Prefect, ServiceNow, Zapier
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 10:27no05 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 12:33yes26 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 13:14yes1225 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 13:19yes206 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 10:54yes2914 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 10:29yes53 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 13:05yes1917 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 09:53yes53 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 13:03no039 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 12:09yes1031 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 09:27yes1454 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 14:02yes525 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 12:48yes98 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 09:23no03 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 09:41yes1327 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 12:04yes206 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 11:03yes2214 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 09:50yes56 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 11:48yes2524 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 11:45yes53 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 09:55yes549 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 12:25yes1020 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 09:36yes2586 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 09:31yes1044 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 10:27yes98 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 11:36yes1013 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 10:54yes1833 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 11:22yes209 s
ComparativeGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 13:25yes2918 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 13:53yes1011 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 10:41yes2025 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 10:11yes53 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 12:45yes539 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 10:43yes2339 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 12:02yes2564 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 14:07yes529 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 12:33yes149 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 13:06yes37 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 13:27yes1927 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 09:46yes206 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 11:18yes4721 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 12:25yes1010 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 09:30yes2019 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 14:11yes53 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 13:25yes571 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 13:47yes1765 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 09:25yes32148 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 11:04yes2189 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 12:20yes1812 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 10:12no07 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 14:05no017 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 13:13yes2010 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 12:26yes1311 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 12:06no08 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 10:43yes1525 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 11:58yes53 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 13:16yes957 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 09:42yes1437 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 13:31yes2869 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 11:43yes518 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 11:37yes1612 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 13:55yes38 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 12:36yes1029 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 10:05yes207 s
Negative framingGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 13:00yes2517 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 12:23yes56 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 11:09yes3028 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 14:09yes54 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 12:17yes2582 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 14:08yes2480 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 12:00yes2948 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 13:41yes2056 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
Astronomer read as Astronomer Astro
Astronomer (Managed Airflow) read as Astronomer Astro
Databricks read as Databricks Lakeflow Jobs
MuleSoft read as MuleSoft Anypoint Platform
Unresolved, counted raw
ANOW!
ActiveBatch
Automation Anywhere
Bizagi
Broadcom Automic Automation
CA-7
Copilot Studio
Frends
IBM Workload Automation
Jinba Flow
NITRO Studio
NetApp Instaclustr for Cadence
Nintex
Pipefy
Ray Workflows
Redwood
Revo
ServiceNow Flow Designer
Stonebranch UAC
Stonebranch Universal Automation Center (UAC)
Temporal/Open Web UI
Tonkean
UiPath Orchestrator
Vellum
Workfront (Adobe)
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.

Also in data platform

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