IT AI Index
Index Security operations Email security › Small business September 2026 Edition

Email security for small business buyers

Asked as “email security platform”, and as “phishing and email threat protection tool”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 52 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing
Clear leader
44% of first choices, clear leader.

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.

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
01Microsoft Defender for Office 36544%7%58endorsed leader
02IRONSCALES19%0%35accepted challenger
03Proofpoint Email Protection6%24%54accepted challenger
04Barracuda Email Protection6%11%27accepted challenger
05Abnormal AI6%0%20accepted challenger
07SpamTitan2%10%20accepted challenger
08Coro2%13%15accepted challenger
Show the two products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
10Mimecast Email Security0%45%31criticized challenger
09Guardz0%0%12accepted 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.

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
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative60%
Key
01Microsoft Defender for Office 36544%
02IRONSCALES19%
03Proofpoint Email Protection6%
04Barracuda Email Protection6%
05Abnormal AI6%
06Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration6%
07SpamTitan2%
08Coro2%
09Guardz0%
10Mimecast Email Security0%

02What they warned about

Six of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, Perplexity Sonar, Grok 4.1 Fast, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash and Qwen 3.7 Flash 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.
Mimecast Email Security
45%
14 of 31 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“Customer satisfaction has declined in recent years, with many reviewers reporting an increase in missed attacks and expressing frustration with the overly complex setup and administration.” Claude Haiku 4.5, negative prompt
Proofpoint Email Protection
24%
13 of 54 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“the best approach is to avoid traditional, expensive Secure Email Gateways (SEGs) like Mimecast or Proofpoint Enterprise” Gemini 3.5 Flash, budget prompt
Barracuda Email Protection
11%
3 of 27 labels negative · 3 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“older on-prem **Barracuda** models ... Why to avoid” Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt
Cisco Secure Email
60%
3 of 5 labels negative · 3 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“Legacy, On-Premises Hardware Appliances (Avoid Completely)” Gemini 3.5 Flash, 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. 781 links across 165 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

41 answers · 41 citations · 10 models
38 answers · 42 citations · 11 models
29 answers · 29 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Consilien28 answers · 30 citations · 10 models
26 answers · 26 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Expert Insights24 answers · 31 citations · 9 models
24 answers · 24 citations · 9 models
vendor site · IRONSCALES20 answers · 28 citations · 8 models
17 answers · 17 citations · 7 models
13 answers · 34 citations · 7 models
vendor site · Proofpoint13 answers · 17 citations · 8 models
12 answers · 18 citations · 5 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.

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 email security platform for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which phishing and email threat protection tool would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top email security platforms for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best email security platform for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating an email security platform. What should we look at?”Negative“Which email security platforms should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5no first choiceIRONSCALESChanged
Three alternativesAbnormal AI, Guardz, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
against: Exchange Online Protection, Google Workspace
IRONSCALES
Four alternativesAbnormal AI, Barracuda Email Protection, Guardz, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
against: Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
IRONSCALES
Three alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, SpamTitan
no first choiceagainst: Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, Mimecast Email Security, SpamTitan
GPT-5.4 miniMicrosoft Defender for Office 365
Four alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, IRONSCALES, Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
Microsoft Defender for Office 365Held
Two alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Proofpoint Email Protection
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Two alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Sophos Email
against: Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
Microsoft 365
Two alternativesMicrosoft Defender for Office 365, SpamTitan
no first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashCheck Point Harmony Email & Collaboration
Two alternativesCoro, IRONSCALES
against: Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Check Point Harmony Email & CollaborationHeld
Two alternativesHuntress, IRONSCALES
against: Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, IRONSCALES
Four alternativesGuardz, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Proofpoint Email Protection, Sublime Security
Sublime Security
Four alternativesCoro, Guardz, IRONSCALES, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
against: Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
no first choice
Six alternativesCheck Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, Huntress, IRONSCALES, Microsoft Defender for Cloud, Proofpoint Email Protection, Sublime Security
against: Mimecast Email Security, Palo Alto Networks, Proofpoint Email Protection
against: Barracuda Email Protection, Cisco Secure Email, Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection, SpamAssassin, Symantec Email Security.cloud
Perplexity SonarIRONSCALES
Two alternativesGuardz, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Microsoft Defender for Office 365Changed
Three alternativesEasyDMARC, Huntress, KnowBe4
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Four alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
against: Sophos Email
Barracuda Email Protection, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Three alternativesCheck Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, IRONSCALES, SpamTitan
no first choicenothing named
Grok 4.1 FastIRONSCALES, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Two alternativesProofpoint Email Protection, SpamTitan
Proofpoint Email ProtectionChanged
One alternativeIRONSCALES
against: Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Four alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, IRONSCALES, Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
Microsoft Defender for Office 365, SpamTitan
Two alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Proofpoint Email Protection
Abnormal AI, IRONSCALES
Three alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, SpamTitan
against: Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
against: Barracuda Email Protection, Cisco Secure Email, Cloudflare, Darktrace EMAIL, Hornetsecurity, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, N-able Mail Assure
Mistral SmallIRONSCALES, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Two alternativesProofpoint Email Protection, SpamTitan
CoroChanged
One alternativeProofpoint Email Protection
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Six alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Coro, IRONSCALES, Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection, Sophos Email
Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration
Three alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, SpamTitan
against: Proofpoint Email Protection
no first choiceagainst: Barracuda Email Security Gateway, Coro, Proofpoint Email Protection
DeepSeek V4 FlashIRONSCALES, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Three alternativesAbnormal AI, Barracuda Email Protection, Proofpoint Email Protection
against: Mimecast Email Security
Microsoft Defender for Office 365Changed
Two alternativesAbnormal AI, Proofpoint Email Protection
IRONSCALES
Four alternativesAbnormal AI, Barracuda Email Protection, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Proofpoint Email Protection
against: Mimecast Email Security
Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Proofpoint Email Protection
Three alternativesBarracuda Email Security Gateway, Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, SpamTitan
IRONSCALES, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Five alternativesAbnormal AI, Coro, Guardz, Proofpoint Email Protection, SpamTitan
against: Acronis Cyber Protect, Mimecast Email Security, Paubox, Proofpoint Email Protection, SpamTitan
Llama 4 MaverickIRONSCALES
Three alternativesCoro, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Proofpoint Email Protection
IRONSCALESHeld
Three alternativesAbnormal AI, ManageEngine's Browser Security Plus, Proofpoint Email Protection
IRONSCALES
Seven alternativesAbnormal AI, Coro, Guardz, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection, Sophos Email
Barracuda Email Protection
Two alternativesCheck Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, IRONSCALES
no first choicenothing named
Qwen 3.7 FlashBarracuda Email Security Service, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
One alternativeGoogle Workspace
against: Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
Abnormal AIChanged
Two alternativesIRONSCALES, Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Four alternativesAbnormal AI, Guardz, IRONSCALES, Proofpoint Email Protection
against: Coro
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Three alternativesBarracuda Email Security Service, Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, SpamTitan GlobalProtect
Abnormal AI, Barracuda Email Protection, SkyHigh, Zixagainst: Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protectionagainst: Cisco Secure Email, Exim, Gmail, Postfix, Proofpoint Email Protection, Sendmail, Yahoo
Kimi K2Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Three alternativesCheck Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, Proofpoint Email Protection, SpamTitan
Microsoft Defender for Office 365Held
Two alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Proofpoint Email Protection
IRONSCALES
Two alternativesMicrosoft Defender for Office 365, Proofpoint Email Protection
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Three alternativesProofpoint Email Protection, SpamTitan, Sublime Security
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Three alternativesAbnormal AI, Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, IRONSCALES
against: Barracuda Email Protection, Darktrace, Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
GLM 4.7 FlashXMicrosoft Defender for Office 365
Two alternativesMimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
Microsoft Defender for Office 365Held
Two alternativesProofpoint Email Protection, SpamTitan
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Six alternativesAbnormal AI, Coro, IRONSCALES, Proofpoint Email Protection, Sophos Email, SpamTitan
against: Mimecast Email Security
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Four alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, KnowBe4 PhishER, Proofpoint Email Protection, Sophos Email
no first choice
Four alternativesBarracuda Email Protection, Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Mimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
against: Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration, FortiMail, Mailgun, Postmark, SendGrid
MiniMax M2.5Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Three alternativesCoro, Proofpoint Email Protection, SpamTitan
Microsoft Defender for Office 365Held
Two alternativesMimecast Email Security, Proofpoint Email Protection
Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Four alternativesCoro, Guardz, IRONSCALES, SpamTitan
Microsoft Defender for Office 365, Proofpoint Email Protection
One alternativeSpamTitan
no first choiceagainst: Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 Exchange Online Protection
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 10:10no04 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 11:17yes35 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 12:10yes1722 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 10:54yes205 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 11:29yes4519 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 11:01yes55 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 10:45yes1716 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 14:03yes53 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 13:18no040 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 09:26yes1436 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 11:14yes22218 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 11:40yes512 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 09:28yes97 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 12:58yes45 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 12:40yes1520 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 13:58yes204 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 12:58yes3114 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 10:49yes54 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 10:45yes1014 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 13:25yes53 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 11:53yes529 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 12:22yes3033 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 09:37yes2432 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 11:03yes1033 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 13:20yes98 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 11:20yes38 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 13:40yes1430 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 12:13yes207 s
ComparativeGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 09:52yes3215 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 11:30yes57 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 14:01yes1822 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 10:07yes53 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 09:26yes537 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 10:25yes822 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 09:30yes990 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 11:50yes2544 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 10:47yes97 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 09:45yes45 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 13:24yes2325 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 10:57yes204 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 11:57yes4019 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 10:54yes54 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 09:34yes810 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 12:09yes57 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 11:12yes530 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 11:39yes947 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 10:57yes9132 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 14:04yes517 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 11:47no05 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 13:52no09 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 10:55yes2125 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 10:30yes208 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 11:36yes1911 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 10:16no07 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 11:56yes1019 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 09:38yes52 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 09:37no042 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 13:48yes952 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 09:43yes15237 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 12:06no055 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 13:43yes2511 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 10:11no04 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 12:58yes2331 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 11:31yes207 s
Negative framingGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 10:33yes2216 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 11:23yes55 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 12:01yes1720 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 13:58yes52 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 11:06no039 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 09:40yes2340 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 12:43yes2035 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 10:48yes1939 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
Abnormal read as Abnormal AI
Barracuda read as Barracuda Email Protection
Check Point read as Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration
Check Point Harmony Email read as Check Point Harmony Email & Collaboration
Cisco read as Cisco Secure Email
Fortinet read as FortiMail
Microsoft Defender read as Microsoft Defender for Office 365
Mimecast read as Mimecast Email Security
Proofpoint read as Proofpoint Email Protection
Proofpoint (Standard) read as Proofpoint Email Protection
Proofpoint Enterprise read as Proofpoint Email Protection
Proofpoint Essentials read as Proofpoint Email Protection
Unresolved, counted raw
EasyDMARC
Exchange Online Protection
Exim
Google Security
Google Vault
KnowBe4 PhishER
MailEnable
Mailgun
ManageEngine's Browser Security Plus
Microsoft 365 Exchange Online Protection (EOP)
N-able Mail Assure
Paubox
Postfix
Postmark
Proofpoint Essentials / Proofpoint 365 Total Protection
SendGrid
Sendmail
SkyHigh
SpamAssassin
SpamTitan / Graphus
SpamTitan GlobalProtect
Trend Micro Office Scan / Apex One
dmarcian
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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