# Zero trust network access: what AI models recommend, September 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, September 2026 Edition. Asked as "ZTNA solution" and as "zero trust remote access tool to replace a VPN", six framings each, to twelve models with search on, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/network/zero-trust-network-access/

**Standing:** Cloudflare One leads with 35% of first choices; verdict contested. 40 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| # | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cloudflare One | 35% | 0% | 29 |
| 2 | Twingate | 28% | 0% | 44 |
| 3 | Cato Networks | 12% | 0% | 16 |
| 4 | OpenVPN CloudConnexa | 10% | 0% | 11 |
| 5 | NordLayer | 2% | 6% | 17 |
| 6 | Check Point Harmony SASE | 2% | 27% | 30 |
| 7 | Zscaler | 2% | 62% | 16 |
| 8 | Zscaler Private Access | 0% | 21% | 29 |
| 9 | Tailscale | 0% | 11% | 19 |
| 10 | Cloudflare Access | 0% | 0% | 14 |
| 11 | Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access | 0% | 12% | 16 |
| 12 | Netskope Private Access | 0% | 0% | 10 |

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

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Cloudflare One, Twingate; alternatives Cato Networks, NordLayer, Zscaler Private Access
- GPT-5.4 mini: Cloudflare One; alternatives Microsoft Entra Private Access, Zscaler Private Access
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Twingate; alternatives Cato Networks, Check Point Harmony SASE, Cloudflare Zero Trust / Cloudflare Access, Microsoft Entra Private Access
- Perplexity Sonar: Cloudflare Access / Cloudflare One; alternatives Cato Networks, Cisco Duo / Secure Access, Twingate, Zscaler Private Access
- Grok 4.1 Fast: Cato Networks; alternatives Check Point Harmony SASE, Cloudflare One, Twingate, Zscaler Private Access
- Mistral Small: Cato Networks; alternatives Netskope, NordLayer, Twingate
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Cato Networks; alternatives Check Point Harmony SASE, Twingate
- Llama 4 Maverick: OpenVPN CloudConnexa; alternatives Cato Networks, Microsoft Entra ID, NordLayer, Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Twingate; alternatives Cato Networks, Cloudflare One
- Kimi K2: Cato Networks; alternatives Check Point Harmony SASE, Cloudflare One, OpenVPN CloudConnexa, Twingate
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Cato Networks; alternatives Check Point Harmony SASE, Cloudflare One, OpenVPN CloudConnexa, Twingate
- MiniMax M2.5: no first choice

## Sources the answers cite

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

- cybersecuritynews.com: 36 answers, 38 citations
- petronellatech.com: 26 answers, 26 citations
- portnox.com: 25 answers, 30 citations
- cyberpress.org: 24 answers, 30 citations
- expertinsights.com: 24 answers, 24 citations
- aimultiple.com: 22 answers, 23 citations
- startwithidentity.com: 15 answers, 15 citations
- akamai.com: 14 answers, 14 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://cybersecuritynews.com/best-ztna-solutions (35 answers)
- https://petronellatech.com/blog/zero-trust-vendors-compared-top-10-smbs-2026 (26 answers)
- https://expertinsights.com/network-security/the-top-zero-trust-network-access-solutions (23 answers)
- https://aimultiple.com/ztna-solutions (22 answers)
- https://cyberpress.org/ztna-solutions-by-business-size (15 answers)
- https://portnox.com/cybersecurity-101/zero-trust/who-are-the-best-ztna-providers (15 answers)
- https://akamai.com/site/en/documents/analyst-report/2024/kuppingercole-ztna-analyst-report.pdf (14 answers)
- https://startwithidentity.com/articles/top-8-zero-trust-network-access-tools (13 answers)
- https://zendikt.com/category/ztna-software (11 answers)
- https://cipherssecurity.com/best-ztna-platforms-2026 (10 answers)

## Warned against

- Zscaler: 10 of 16 labels negative. "CVE-2025-54982 - SAML authentication bypass; failed to validate SAML assertion signatures | Complete authentication bypass" (Kimi K2, negative prompt)
- Netskope: 7 of 15 labels negative. "Cross-tenant vulnerabilities with leaked enrollment tokens | Attackers could compromise ANY organization" (Kimi K2, negative prompt)
- Check Point Harmony SASE: 8 of 30 labels negative. "(Perimeter 81/Harmony SASE) | Hard-coded encryption keys in diagnostic logs | Customer data exposure" (Kimi K2, negative prompt)
- Zscaler Private Access: 6 of 29 labels negative. "they are generally not recommended for mid-sized B2B companies" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, paraphrase 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.