18 categories · RankedCisco
224Judge labels
12First choices
60Negative labels
14 / 14Models named it
18Categories
October 2026 Edition. Every number here is derived from the raw labels under vendor table v2026-10.8, every buyer segment counted.
Best standing
9% in Data center networking for enterprise buyers
Rank 4 of 165 in the mid-market standingcriticized challenger
2 of 14 models made it the first choice on the direct prompt; 32% of its 28 labels there were negative.
What the models named instead of Cisco →By buyer segmentRead the same way at every buyer size.
Small business167 of 170
0%5 labels
under the label threshold
Mid-market4 of 165
5%28 labels
criticized challenger
Enterprise4 of 125
9%24 labels
criticized challenger
In data center networking · 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 Cisco 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Data center networking | Network and edge | 5% | 4 of 165 | 32% | 28 | criticized challenger | |
| SASE platforms | Network and edge | 0% | 13 of 45 | 20% | 15 | accepted challenger | =heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked. |
| SD-WAN | Network and edge | 0% | 11 of 73 | 20% | 10 | accepted challenger | ▼−2Since September 2026: 2% → 0%, −2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked. |
| Microsegmentation | Network and edge | 0% | 25 of 94 | 14% | 7 | under 10 labels · led by ColorTokens Xshield at 25% | |
| Zero trust network access | Network and edge | 0% | 57 of 66 | 43% | 7 | under 10 labels · led by Twingate at 39% | =heldSince September 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise. Read over the models both editions asked. |
| DDI and IP address management | Network and edge | 0% | 19 of 115 | 0% | 5 | under 10 labels · led by BlueCat Micetro at 15% | |
| Business phone systems | IT operations and endpoint | 0% | 42 of 75 | 25% | 4 | under 10 labels · led by RingCentral at 29% | |
| Network detection and response | Security operations | 0% | 32 of 102 | 0% | 3 | under 10 labels · led by ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer at 21% | |
| OT and IoT security | Security operations | 0% | 21 of 107 | 0% | 3 | under 10 labels · led by Microsoft Defender for IoT at 21% | |
| AI SOC agents | Security operations | 0% | 57 of 104 | 0% | 2 | under 10 labels · led by Dropzone AI at 24% | |
| Network access control | Network and edge | 0% | 89 of 111 | 50% | 2 | under 10 labels · led by Portnox Cloud at 35% | |
| AI security platforms | Security operations | 0% | 155 of 233 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by SentinelOne Singularity at 11% | |
| API security platforms | Security operations | 0% | 82 of 93 | 100% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Aikido Security at 12% | |
| Breach and attack simulation | Security operations | 0% | 73 of 74 | 100% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Cymulate at 24% | |
| Data virtualization | Data platform | 0% | 51 of 99 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Denodo at 28% | |
| Non-human identity management | Identity and access | 0% | 57 of 128 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by JumpCloud at 14% | |
| Observability platforms | IT operations and endpoint | 0% | 47 of 80 | 0% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Grafana at 27% | newNew since September 2026: not ranked then, 0% now. |
| SaaS security posture management | Security operations | 0% | 85 of 95 | 100% | 1 | under 10 labels · led by Wing Security at 30% |
Movement
This is the first edition on this tier, so no move can be computed for Cisco yet. From the next edition this section shows, per buyer segment and per category, whether its share moved by more than the measured noise floor.
By model
How each model treated Cisco 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 Cisco 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 | 5 | 0 | 5 |
| GPT-5.4 mini | 0 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 6 |
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | 0 | 5 | 0 | 3 | 8 |
| Perplexity Sonar | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| Grok 4.20 | 1 | 2 | 7 | 2 | 12 |
| Mistral Small | 1 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 5 |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | 0 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 10 |
| Llama 4 Maverick | 1 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 4 |
| Qwen 3.7 Flash | 1 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 13 |
| Kimi K2 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 6 |
| GLM 4.7 FlashX | 0 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 5 |
| MiniMax M2.5 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 1 | 7 |
| GPT-6 Luna | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 3 |
| Muse Glimmer 30B | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 6 |
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
Direct36 labels5
Paraphrase21 labels3
Comparative61 labels5not counted in share
Budget-constrained15 labelsNone
Scale-constrained41 labels4
Negative50 labels3not counted in share
First choiceAlternativeMentionNegative224 labels in all, every segment counted; 12 of the 20 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.
“Cisco: breadth, intent-based ACI, hybrid cloud and optical DCI... enterprises needing a single vendor stack and ACI policy often choose Cisco” Muse Glimmer 30B · Data center networking · comparative prompt · first choice
“Cisco's Nexus platform is often recommended due to its balance of performance, ease of management, and strong ecosystem support” Mistral Small · Data center networking · direct prompt · first choice
“generally considered the top two contenders due to their balance of performance, manageability, and Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)” Qwen 3.7 Flash · Data center networking · direct prompt · first choice
“Cisco's SD-WAN is considered a better alternative for environments that depend on centrally governed WAN policy operations.” Llama 4 Maverick · SD-WAN · negative prompt · first choice
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 buying BAS solely as an add-on from your primary security infrastructure vendor” DeepSeek V4 Flash · BAS · negative prompt · hard negative
“vendors built on extensive acquisitions (such as Cisco’s complex legacy of Umbrella, Duo, and Meraki/Viptela) historically show much higher "partial integration" rates” Gemini 3.5 Flash · SASE · negative prompt · soft negative
“Some Gartner clients report higher rates of issues compared to other vendors, typically around product complexity, software quality, and support timeliness” MiniMax M2.5 · Data center networking · negative prompt · soft negative
“some platforms that may be worth avoiding or being cautious about include: * Cisco (according to Gartner's Magic Quadrant for Data Center Networking)” Llama 4 Maverick · Data center networking · negative prompt · soft negative
Named alongside
The products named in the same answers as Cisco, over the 224 answers that named it. Took the first choice instead counts the answers where the other product was the first choice and Cisco was named but was not.ShowHide
Named alongside
The products named in the same answers as Cisco, over the 224 answers that named it. Took the first choice instead counts the answers where the other product was the first choice and Cisco 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 Cisco. 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 199 of the 224 answers that named Cisco and are not a share of its labels.
Domains cited
gartner.com64
cisco.comYour site54
g2.com45
guideflow.com43
peerspot.com40
linkedin.com34
scribd.com30
fortinet.com28
forrester.com27
us.fitgap.com26
337 of the 391 domain citations in answers naming Cisco came from somebody else's page.
Pages cited
Pages are listed as the models cited them.
Search and answers
cisco.com ranks 2 on Google for the category's searches. In the answers, Cisco takes 5% of first choices and Arista Networks takes 27%.ShowHide
Search and answers
cisco.com ranks 2 on Google for the category's searches. In the answers, Cisco takes 5% of first choices and Arista Networks takes 27%.
ShowHideIn search
Google, US estimatesPosition for “data center switching platform”
2
Position for “data center networking platforms”
–
not in the top ten
- Searches for its name, Google
- 165,000 a month (“cisco”)
- AI search demand for its name, est.
- 48,352 a month
- Organic visits to its site
- about 5,114,808 a month
- Searches its site ranks for
- 153,465 · 35,558 in the top three
- Sites linking to it
- 199,308
- Paid Google search
- 8 searches its ads show for, about 107 clicks and $683 a month (estimate)
In answers
This editionShare of first choices
5%
rank 4 of 165 in data center networking
Segment leader
27%
Arista Networks
- First choices
- 12 across its categories
- Named in
- 224 answers
- Its own site cited
- in 199 of the answers that named it
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.
What it publishes
ShowHide
What it publishes
ShowHideAddresses on cisco.com
551
subdomains included
Content
34
counted in the table below
Documentation
20
Product · Integration
0 · 0
| Kind | Pages | Last 90 days | 2025-10 to 2026-09 | Latest | Categories named |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Blog | 25 | 22 | 2026-09-01 | ||
| Conference or event | 8 | undated | |||
| News or press | 1 | 1 | 2026-07-08 |
Most recent
- 2026-09-01You say no five questions can help you spot overlooked talent blog
- 2026-08-30Why quality hire starts day one blog
- 2026-07-23Cisco talent bridge candidate user guide blog
- 2026-07-23Cisco talent bridge recruiter user guide blog
- 2026-07-15Cisco talent bridge candidate demo blog
- 2026-07-15Cisco talent bridge recruiter demo blog
How it is countedHide how it is counted
Every page cisco.com exposes, subdomains included. Kind is read from the address and title. The last 90 days, the latest date and the twelve months count pages by when they were published, from the site's feeds, a date in the address, or the page's own publication date, read from up to a hundred of its most recently changed pages; a page that says only when it last changed is counted in its kind but not in when, so the recent counts are a floor, and a kind none of whose pages gives a publication date reads undated. An event counts as online when its address or title says so (webinar, on demand, virtual or online summit); a conference, summit, trade show, expo or roadshow that does not say so is counted as a conference or event, which on a vendor's site is mostly in person. Read September 29, 2026.
Names read as Cisco
What the judge wrote, as written, with how often. The vendor table decides that these count as Cisco; a claim can dispute any of them.
AppDynamics/Cisco 1Cisco (Catalyst 9000/Nexus) 1Cisco (Catalyst SD-WAN & Cisco Meraki) 1Cisco (Catalyst SD-WAN, formerly Viptela) 1Cisco (Catalyst/Viptela or Meraki) 1Cisco (Cisco Secure Connect) 1Cisco (Duo + Umbrella + Secure Access) 1Cisco (Meraki + Duo) 1Cisco (Meraki/Catalyst) 1Cisco (Nexus + Nexus Dashboard Fabric Controller) 1Cisco (Nexus 9000) 1Cisco (Nexus) 1Cisco (Prime Network Registrar) 1Cisco (Secure Access by Cisco) 1Cisco (Secure Access) 1Cisco (Secure Network Analytics) 1Cisco (Secure Workload & Cisco Hypershield) 1Cisco (Secure Workload) 1Cisco (Umbrella + Viptela) 1Cisco (Viad Network / Meraki) 1Cisco (Webex) 1Cisco (e.g., Nexus series, ACI) 1Cisco / Splunk 1Cisco/Astrix 1
Follow Cisco
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.
The company
Cisco is its own company.ShowHide
The company
Cisco is its own company.
ShowHideIn its own words
Stated by the vendor, not checked- Positioning
- Cisco is a worldwide technology leader powering an inclusive future for all.
- Free plan or trial
- Cisco Security free trials cisco.com
- Customers named
- UnitedMcLaren Mastercard Formula 1 teamCarnivalFujifilmSTCNestleFiservWorkday
- Not stated on the pages read
- Who it is for, price, starting price, integrations, certifications, hosting
What Cisco's own pages state, read September 28, 2026: cisco.com, trust.cisco.com. A claimed page can correct any of them.
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 Cisco'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 Cisco, 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 Cisco by email, built from the raw record of the edition. It shows:
- where Cisco 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 Cisco, 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.