HR AI Index
Index › Talent acquisition › September 2026 Edition

Applicant tracking systems

Asked as “applicant tracking system”, and as “ATS”, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. 45 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing
Greenhouse
Clear leader
47% of first choices, clear leader.
ShowinginAll 50 categories →

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.
Small businessBreezy HR41%Clear leaderStanding →Mid-marketGreenhouse47%Clear leaderThis pageEnterpriseGreenhouse47%Clear leaderStanding →

01The standing

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all twelve models, for a mid-market B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01Greenhouse47%6%50endorsed leader
02Breezy HR18%5%19accepted challenger
03Zoho Recruit9%0%25accepted challenger
04Lever7%12%43accepted challenger
05Ashby7%0%26accepted challenger
06Workable4%0%36accepted challenger
07Pinpoint4%0%24accepted challenger
08Manatal2%0%10accepted challenger
Show the five products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
13Oracle Taleo0%100%10criticized challenger
12Workday Recruiting0%83%12criticized challenger
11iCIMS0%47%15criticized challenger
10JazzHR0%8%26accepted challenger
09BambooHR0%0%21accepted 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.
Head to head
Greenhouse vs Breezy HRGreenhouse vs Zoho RecruitBreezy HR vs Zoho Recruit

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
11
12
13
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative60%
Key
01Greenhouse47%
02Breezy HR18%
03Zoho Recruit9%
04Lever7%
05Ashby7%
06Workable4%
07Pinpoint4%
08Manatal2%
09BambooHR0%
10JazzHR0%
11iCIMS0%
12Workday Recruiting0%
13Oracle Taleo0%

02What they warned about

Five of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, Kimi K2 and MiniMax M2.5 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.
Oracle Taleo
100%
10 of 10 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 8 hard negative
“flagged as tools to avoid if you're an SMB because they come with **enterprise pricing and complexity**” Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt
Workday Recruiting
83%
10 of 12 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 7 hard negative
“Workday lawsuit... alleging that when applying via their ATS, the algorithm resulted in his rejection by more than 100 jobs” Claude Haiku 4.5, negative prompt
iCIMS
47%
7 of 15 labels negative · 7 of 12 models · 5 hard negative
“Often grouped with Workday and Taleo as a legacy system that's increasingly seen as a blocker” Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt
SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting
100%
6 of 6 labels negative · 5 of 12 models · 4 hard negative
“**Why avoid**: Overly rigid processes; customization often requires expensive consulting support” Qwen 3.7 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

65 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. 738 links across 203 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

selectsoftwarereviews.com
vendor site · Select Software Reviews35 answers · 40 citations · 10 models
peoplemanagingpeople.com
vendor site · People Managing People25 answers · 25 citations · 10 models
zapier.com
vendor site · Zapier23 answers · 23 citations · 10 models
forbes.com
20 answers · 27 citations · 10 models
pinpointhq.com
20 answers · 21 citations · 10 models
100hires.com
vendor site · 100Hires19 answers · 24 citations · 10 models
pin.com
vendor site · Pin19 answers · 20 citations · 10 models
capterra.com
18 answers · 25 citations · 10 models
greenhouse.com
vendor site · Greenhouse15 answers · 20 citations · 7 models
recruitee.com
vendor site · Recruitee14 answers · 17 citations · 8 models
ventureharbour.com
13 answers · 14 citations · 8 models
lever.co
vendor site · Lever11 answers · 14 citations · 8 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.

selectsoftwarereviews.com/buyer-guide/applicant-tracking-systems
33 answers · 10 models
zapier.com/blog/best-applicant-tracking-systems
23 answers · 10 models
pinpointhq.com/insights/best-applicant-tracking-system
20 answers · 10 models
peoplemanagingpeople.com/tools/best-applicant-tracking-systems
19 answers · 9 models
pin.com/blog/best-applicant-tracking-systems
16 answers · 10 models
forbes.com/advisor/business/best-applicant-tracking-systems
15 answers · 9 models
ventureharbour.com/applicant-tracking-systems
13 answers · 8 models
100hires.com/best-ats-for-mid-market-companies.html
12 answers · 9 models
capterra.com/resources/best-applicant-tracking-system
10 answers · 7 models
forbes.com/advisor/ca/business/best-applicant-tracking-systems
9 answers · 6 models

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 applicant tracking system for a mid-market B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which ATS would you recommend to a mid-sized B2B company?”Comparative“What are the top applicant tracking systems and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best applicant tracking system for a company with a limited budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 500 person company evaluating an applicant tracking system. What should we look at?”Negative“Which applicant tracking systems should I avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5no first choiceGreenhouseChanged
Three alternativesAshby, Lever, Workable
no first choice
Three alternativesGreenhouse, Workable, iCIMS
Breezy HR, Zoho Recruit
Three alternativesJazzHR, Manatal, Recooty
no first choiceagainst: Oracle Taleo, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
GPT-5.4 miniGreenhouse
Three alternativesLever, SmartRecruiters, Workable
GreenhouseHeld
Two alternativesAshby, Lever
Greenhouse
Five alternativesAshby, BambooHR, Lever, SmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting
Zoho Recruit
Two alternativesApplicantStack, TalentHR
no first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashAshby
Four alternativesBambooHR, Greenhouse, Lever, Rippling
AshbyHeld
Four alternativesGreenhouse, Lever, Rippling, Workable
Ashby, Greenhouse
Four alternativesBambooHR, Lever, Rippling, Workable
against: JazzHR, Workday RecruitingBreezy HR, Manatal
Three alternativesHomebase, JazzHR, Zoho Recruit
no first choiceagainst: Leveragainst: ADP, Bullhorn, Oracle Taleo, Paycom, Paycor, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Perplexity SonarGreenhouse
Three alternativesAshby, Pinpoint, Workable
GreenhouseHeld
Four alternativesAshby, Lever, Pinpoint, Workable
Greenhouse
Eight alternativesAshby, BambooHR, Breezy HR, JazzHR, Lever, Workable, Workday Recruiting, Zoho Recruit
Breezy HR
Three alternativesJazzHR, Manatal, Zoho Recruit
no first choiceagainst: ADP, Oracle Taleo, Recooty, Trakstar Hire, Workday Recruiting
Grok 4.1 FastGreenhouse
Two alternativesLever, Workable
GreenhouseHeld
Four alternativesAshby, BambooHR, Lever, Workable
no first choiceBreezy HR
Four alternatives100Hires, JazzHR, Manatal, Zoho Recruit
no first choiceagainst: Bullhorn, Cornerstone OnDemand, Jobvite, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, UKG Pro, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Mistral SmallGreenhouse, Pinpoint
Two alternativesLever, Workable
GreenhouseChanged
Two alternativesJazzHR, Zoho Recruit
no first choiceBreezy HR
Three alternativesJazzHR, Manatal, Zoho Recruit
no first choicenothing named
DeepSeek V4 FlashGreenhouse, Workable
One alternativeAshby
GreenhouseChanged
Five alternativesAshby, BambooHR, Lever, Pinpoint, Workable
Greenhouse
Eight alternativesBambooHR, Breezy HR, JazzHR, Lever, Rippling, SmartRecruiters, Workable, iCIMS
Breezy HR
Five alternativesHomebase, JazzHR, Manatal, Workable, Zoho Recruit
against: Greenhouse, Lever, iCIMSno first choiceagainst: Bullhorn, Cornerstone OnDemand, Oracle Taleo, Workday Recruiting
Llama 4 MaverickPinpoint
Four alternativesGreenhouse, JazzHR, Lever, Workable
LeverChanged
Three alternativesAshby, Greenhouse, Treegarden
no first choiceBreezy HR
Three alternativesJazzHR, Manatal, Zoho Recruit
no first choiceagainst: Breezy HR, Jobvite, Trakstar Hire
Qwen 3.7 FlashGreenhouse
Three alternativesLever, Pinpoint, Workable
Ashby, GreenhouseChanged
Two alternativesLever, Workable
Greenhouse
Seven alternativesBambooHR, Breezy HR, Bullhorn, JazzHR, Lever, Workable, Zoho Recruit
Zoho Recruit
Three alternativesHubSpot, Indeed, JazzHR
against: Greenhouse, LeverGreenhouse
Six alternativesAshby, BambooHR, Lever, Personio, SmartRecruiters, Workable
against: Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruitingagainst: Cornerstone OnDemand, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Kimi K2Greenhouse
Three alternativesAshby, Pinpoint, Workable
against: LeverGreenhouse, WorkableChanged
Three alternativesJazzHR, Lever, Pinpoint
Greenhouse
Five alternativesBambooHR, Breezy HR, Lever, Workable, Zoho Recruit
Zoho Recruit
Three alternatives100Hires, ApplicantStack, Breezy HR
against: JazzHRno first choiceagainst: Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
GLM 4.7 FlashXGreenhouse
Four alternativesAshby, BambooHR, Lever, Workable
GreenhouseHeld
Four alternativesBambooHR, Personio, Workable, Zoho Recruit
no first choiceBreezy HR
Three alternatives100Hires, GoHire, Zoho Recruit
against: Jobsoidno first choiceagainst: Bullhorn, Cornerstone OnDemand, Greenhouse, Jobvite, Lever, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, SmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
MiniMax M2.5Greenhouse, Lever
Three alternativesPinpoint, Workable, Zoho Recruit
100Hires, GreenhouseChanged
Two alternativesPinpoint, Zoho Recruit
no first choice
Seven alternativesBambooHR, Breezy HR, Deel HR, Greenhouse, Pinpoint, Workable, Zoho Recruit
Greenhouse, Lever
Two alternativesBreezy HR, Zoho Recruit
no first choiceagainst: Oracle Taleo, PeopleSoft, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting
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 17:10no05 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:20yes46 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:20yes1523 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:16yes206 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:04yes3818 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:00yes56 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 16:58yes1014 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:10yes53 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:10yes549 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:06yes1025 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:08yes2996 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:03yes829 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:20yes129 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:21yes36 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:04yes821 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:06yes206 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:14yes3117 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:13yes55 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:11yes814 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:00yes54 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:01yes2057 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:13yes919 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:05yes1037 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:15yes514 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:03yes1810 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:13yes710 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:00yes1823 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:05yes207 s
ComparativeGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:12yes2213 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:06yes56 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:16yes1619 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:04yes53 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 16:57yes524 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:14yes1430 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:12yes1023 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:05yes1031 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:09yes98 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 16:57yes14 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:09yes2121 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:20yes205 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:06yes1410 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:15yes55 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:12yes910 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:17yes51 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:21no029 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:07yes518 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:14yes9139 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:07no010 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:15no08 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 16:58no07 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:01yes1227 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 16:57yes209 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:17yes1310 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:01no011 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-09-17 17:15yes950 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:16yes53 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:12yes527 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:12yes1527 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 16:58yes1056 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 16:59yes522 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:12yes189 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:19no04 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 16:58yes2324 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 16:58yes207 s
Negative framingGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 16:58yes4120 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:07yes55 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:10yes2237 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:07yes53 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:03yes1441 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:12yes2035 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:04yes26113 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:01yes1426 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
Cornerstone read as Cornerstone OnDemand
Cornerstone (Saba / Cornerstone OnDemand) read as Cornerstone OnDemand
SAP SuccessFactors read as SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting
SuccessFactors (SAP) read as SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting
Taleo read as Oracle Taleo
Workday read as Workday Recruiting
iCIMS Talent Cloud read as iCIMS
Unresolved, counted raw
CATS
Jobtoolz
Tellent
Ubeeo
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.

Also in talent acquisition

The other categories of this function, with the leader in each.
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