# Chef: how AI models rank it, September 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, September 2026 Edition. Named in 14 judge labels across 2 categories by 9 of 12 models. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/vendors/chef/

## Standing by category

| Category | Share | Rank | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Infrastructure as code | 0% | 45 | 69% | 13 |
| Secrets management | 0% | 27 | 100% | 1 |

## And against it

- "Chef Infra Server hits end-of-life in Nov 2026... Avoid for new work: Pure legacy config tools" (Grok 4.1 Fast, IaC)
- "Avoid for new projects: Chef, Puppet, SaltStack (commercial), CDKTF." (DeepSeek V4 Flash, IaC)
- "avoid using them as your primary provisioning tool" (Kimi K2, IaC)
- "Avoid for infrastructure provisioning." (Gemini 3.5 Flash, IaC)

## 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.