Small business=heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.
0%from 0% in September 2026
Inside the floor by 11 pointsRank 65 → 71 of 77
Azure
109Judge labels
6First choices
39Negative labels
14 / 14Models named it
12Categories
October 2026 Edition. Every number here is derived from the raw labels under vendor table v2026-10.8, every buyer segment counted.
Best standing
6% in Cloud hosting for enterprise buyers
Rank 6 of 85 in the mid-market standingcriticized challenger
1 of 14 models made it the first choice on the direct prompt; 29% of its 21 labels there were negative.
What the models named instead of Azure →By buyer segmentRead the same way at every buyer size.
Small business75 of 81
0%20 labels
criticized challenger
Mid-market6 of 85
4%21 labels
criticized challenger
Enterprise3 of 44
6%17 labels
criticized challenger
In cloud hosting · each standing computed within its segment · bars are 0 to 100 · the accent bar is the product's own best reading
Standing by category
Every category where a model named Azure for a mid-market B2B company. Share is first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts; rank is within every product named in that category.
| Category | Function | Share | Rank | Negative rate | Labels | Quadrant | Since September 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cloud hosting | Cloud and infrastructure | 4% | 6 of 85 | 29% | 21 | criticized challenger | ▲+2Since September 2026: 0% → 2%, +2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked. |
| Load balancers | Network and edge | 0% | 28 of 94 | 0% | 3 | under 10 labels · led by HAProxy at 29% | |
| Enterprise storage systems | Cloud and infrastructure | 0% | 47 of 167 | 0% | 2 | under 10 labels · led by Dell PowerStore at 16% | |
| Content delivery networks | Network and edge | 0% | 19 of 49 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Cloudflare at 68% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. |
| Data masking and test data management | Data platform | 0% | 124 of 140 | 100% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by DATPROF at 17% | |
| Deception technology | Security operations | 0% | 59 of 94 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Thinkst Canary at 37% | |
| LLM gateways and observability | Data platform | 0% | 40 of 69 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by LiteLLM at 31% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. |
| Managed DNS | Network and edge | 0% | 44 of 78 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Cloudflare DNS at 84% | |
| Managed Kubernetes platforms | Cloud and infrastructure | 0% | 45 of 52 | 100% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Google Kubernetes Engine at 43% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. |
| Managed relational databases | Data platform | 0% | 45 of 82 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Amazon RDS at 45% | goneNot named this edition; 0% in September 2026. |
| Secrets management | Identity and access | 0% | 31 of 59 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by HashiCorp Vault at 31% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. |
| Telemetry pipelines | IT operations and endpoint | 0% | 81 of 124 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by OpenTelemetry Collector at 37% |
Movement
Since September 2026, Azure held within the floor in all twelve categories: no change cleared 11 points.
Best category · Cloud hosting · by segment
Mid-market▲+2Since September 2026: 0% → 2%, +2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.
2%from 0% in September 2026
Inside the floor by 9 pointsRank 19 → 11 of 75
Enterprise▼−2Since September 2026: 5% → 2%, −2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked.
2%from 5% in September 2026
Inside the floor by 9 pointsRank 4 of 41, unchanged
All categories · Mid-market
| Category | September 2026 | Now | Change | Reading | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cloud hosting | 0% | 2% | ▲+2Since September 2026: 0% → 2%, +2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked. | Within noise | Rank 19 → 6 of 85 |
| Load balancers | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 28 of 94, unchanged |
| Enterprise storage | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 47 of 167, unchanged |
| CDN | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 19 of 49, unchanged |
| Data masking | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 124 of 140, unchanged |
| Deception | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 59 of 94, unchanged |
| LLM gateways | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 40 of 69, unchanged |
| Managed DNS | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 44 of 78, unchanged |
| Managed Kubernetes | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 45 of 52, unchanged |
| Managed databases | 0% | 0% | =heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked. | Within noise | Rank 55 → 45 of 82 |
| Secrets | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 31 of 59, unchanged |
| Telemetry pipelines | 0% | 0% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. | New this edition | Rank 81 of 124, unchanged |
Shares here are read over the models both editions asked, so they can differ by a point or two from the standing above, which counts every model in this edition.
The floor is 11 points of share, measured: how far the models move a leader on their own when the same questions are asked twice with nothing changed. A larger change is movement; a smaller one is noise, and both are shown. Movement is read over the twelve models both editions asked; GPT-6 Luna, Muse Glimmer 30B joined this edition and are in the standing but not yet in the comparison. How the floor is measured · The editions
By model
How each model treated Azure across every prompt where it was named for a mid-market B2B company. Fourteen models, six prompts per category.ShowHide
By model
How each model treated Azure across every prompt where it was named for a mid-market B2B company. Fourteen models, six prompts per category.
ShowHide| Model | First choice | Alternative | Mention | Negative | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Haiku 4.5 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| GPT-5.4 mini | 0 | 0 | 4 | 1 | 5 |
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Perplexity Sonar | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| Grok 4.20 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| Mistral Small | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Llama 4 Maverick | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 3 |
| Qwen 3.7 Flash | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| Kimi K2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 |
| GLM 4.7 FlashX | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| MiniMax M2.5 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 1 | 5 |
| GPT-6 Luna | 0 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 4 |
| Muse Glimmer 30B | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
By framing
Which of the six questions produced the naming. By model says how often; this says asked what. The first-choice count on the right carries the marks of the models that produced it.
FramingLabels by classFirst choices
Direct14 labels2
Paraphrase13 labels1
Comparative12 labelsNone
Budget-constrained19 labels3
Scale-constrained15 labelsNone
Negative36 labels2not counted in share
First choiceAlternativeMentionNegative109 labels in all, every segment counted; 6 of the 8 first choices count toward share, since the comparative and negative framings do not. The bar is one segment per label class, to scale within the framing.
What the models said for it
Verbatim evidence the judge attached to positive labels.
“Azure is the most common safe middle ground: hybrid-friendly, enterprise-grade compliance, familiar tooling” Muse Glimmer 30B · Cloud hosting · paraphrase prompt · first choice
“For most mid-market B2B companies, I'd suggest AWS or Azure” MiniMax M2.5 · Cloud hosting · direct prompt · first choice
“If your organization is Microsoft-heavy or planning a hybrid environment, Azure becomes a strong alternative.” GLM 4.7 FlashX · Cloud hosting · paraphrase prompt · alternative
“Your company already relies heavily on Microsoft... Azure Arc is designed to manage resources across those environments.” GPT-6 Luna · Cloud hosting · direct prompt · alternative
And against it
Verbatim evidence attached to negative labels. A warning on a product with few labels is a warning; on a product with many, it is one voice among them.
“Avoid AWS and Azure for limited budgets” Kimi K2 · Cloud hosting · budget prompt · hard negative
“Native masking options in cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP, Snowflake) work well for single-platform environments but struggle when masking spans multiple systems” MiniMax M2.5 · Data masking · negative prompt · soft negative
“AWS, Azure, and GCloud may not be suitable for small startups without a lot of infrastructure experience” Llama 4 Maverick · Managed Kubernetes · negative prompt · soft negative
“You may want to avoid these hyperscalers unless you require their advanced features and global reach.” Mistral Small · Cloud hosting · negative prompt · soft negative
Named alongside
The products named in the same answers as Azure, over the 109 answers that named it. Took the first choice instead counts the answers where the other product was the first choice and Azure was named but was not.ShowHide
Named alongside
The products named in the same answers as Azure, over the 109 answers that named it. Took the first choice instead counts the answers where the other product was the first choice and Azure was named but was not.
ShowHideProductSame answerTook the first choice insteadHead to head
A head-to-head page exists where both products are among a category's top eight. The other rows are the same fact without a page behind them, so they link to the product instead.
What carried it into the answer
The sites and pages cited by the answers that named Azure. A fact about retrieval, not a lever on the model.
Citations exist only for the models that return a source list, five of the fourteen in this edition, so these counts come from 97 of the 109 answers that named Azure and are not a share of its labels.
Domains cited
atlantic.net23
digitalocean.com18
aws.amazon.com17
g2.com15
hostingadvice.com12
learn.microsoft.com12
linkedin.com12
docs.aws.amazon.com11
it-ai-index.com11
sourceforge.net11
No domain is on file for Azure, so its own site is not marked.
Pages cited
Pages are listed as the models cited them.
Search and answers
Where Azure stands in Google search beside where it stands in the models' answers.ShowHide
Search and answers
Where Azure stands in Google search beside where it stands in the models' answers.
ShowHideIn search
Google, US estimates- Searches for its name, Google
- 301,000 a month (“azure”)
- AI search demand for its name, est.
- 47,904 a month
- Its own site
- No site of its own on file, so no site figures
In answers
This editionShare of first choices
4%
rank 6 of 85 in cloud hosting
Segment leader
32%
Amazon Web Services
- First choices
- 6 across its categories
- Named in
- 109 answers
- Its own site cited
- No site on file to match
Search figures are US estimates from DataForSEO, read September 28, 2026; AI search demand is its modeled, directional estimate, not a count of queries to any assistant. The answers are this edition's. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.
Follow Azure
An email the morning each edition publishes: where this product moved, where it held, and by how much against the noise floor. One address, confirmed by a click; a stop link in every email.
Already following? Everything you follow, with a stop for each.
Is this your product?
Claim this page
Claiming is free and changes nothing in the data. A claimed page shows a verified contact who is told when each edition publishes and when Azure's standing changes by more than the noise floor; the right to propose corrections to the vendor table, meaning names the judge wrote that should or should not read as Azure, applied by version and listed in the change log; and a one-line description supplied by the vendor and marked as such.
What a new claim receivesHide what a new claim receives
A new claim receives the current edition's vendor brief for Azure by email, built from the raw record of the edition. It shows:
- where Azure is named, by buyer and by framing, and which cells hold its first choices;
- the claims the models make when they name it, ranked, with the strongest and the weakest quoted;
- its vocabulary against the segment leader's, and the pages the models cited;
- who was chosen in the answers that did not name Azure, and every reason the record gives;
- a battlecard for each top rival: the head-to-head split, why they win, and the reservation quoted against them;
- one page of published figures cleared to show a buyer.