HR AI Index
Index Talent acquisition Applicant tracking syste › Enterprise September 2026 Edition

Applicant tracking systems for enterprise buyers

Asked as “applicant tracking system”, and as “ATS”, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. 43 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing
Clear leader
47% 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 an enterprise B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01Greenhouse47%11%55endorsed leader
02iCIMS19%21%56accepted challenger
03Workday Recruiting12%38%48criticized challenger
04Pinpoint7%7%14accepted challenger
05SmartRecruiters2%4%25accepted challenger
06Oracle Taleo2%57%23criticized challenger
Show the two products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
08SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting0%43%30criticized challenger
07Lever0%16%31accepted 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
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative60%
Key
01Greenhouse47%
02iCIMS19%
03Workday Recruiting12%
04Pinpoint7%
05SmartRecruiters2%
06Oracle Taleo2%
07Lever0%
08SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting0%

02What they warned about

Three of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, Gemini 3.5 Flash, Grok 4.1 Fast, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, GLM 4.7 FlashX 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.
Workday Recruiting
38%
18 of 48 labels negative · 12 of 12 models · 7 hard negative
“Clunky UI, overwhelming workflows, poor mobile experience, limited sourcing and automation, and high drop-off rates for candidates” Mistral Small, negative prompt
Oracle Taleo
57%
13 of 23 labels negative · 10 of 12 models · 9 hard negative
“they have quietly transitioned it to a legacy offering with no more major updates... Taleo is not the answer” Claude Haiku 4.5, negative prompt
SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting
43%
13 of 30 labels negative · 10 of 12 models · 5 hard negative
“Overly rigid processes, poor recruiter and hiring manager experience, and customization often requires expensive consulting support” Mistral Small, negative prompt
iCIMS
21%
12 of 56 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 4 hard negative
“High costs for "basic" features; subpar customer support; over-customization leads to maintenance nightmares.” Grok 4.1 Fast, 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. 5 of those lists are Google grounding redirects that name no site and are left out of the counts. 905 links across 242 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

vendor site · Darwinbox38 answers · 39 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Select Software Reviews33 answers · 38 citations · 10 models
vendor site · People Managing People29 answers · 30 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Greenhouse28 answers · 44 citations · 11 models
28 answers · 29 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Pin27 answers · 39 citations · 10 models
21 answers · 28 citations · 9 models
16 answers · 16 citations · 8 models
vendor site · Gem13 answers · 13 citations · 5 models
vendor site · Treegarden11 answers · 15 citations · 6 models
11 answers · 13 citations · 7 models
11 answers · 12 citations · 6 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 applicant tracking system for an enterprise B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which ATS would you recommend to a large B2B company with thousands of employees?”Comparative“What are the top enterprise-grade applicant tracking systems and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best applicant tracking system for a large company that needs predictable total cost across thousands of users?”Scale-constrained“We are a 5,000 person company with SSO, SOC 2 and procurement review requirements evaluating an applicant tracking system. What should we look at?”Negative“Which applicant tracking systems should a large enterprise avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5no first choiceGreenhouseChanged
Two alternativesWorkday Recruiting, iCIMS
SmartRecruiters
Two alternativesGreenhouse, Lever
against: iCIMS
Workable
One alternativeiCIMS
against: Greenhouse
no first choiceagainst: Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
GPT-5.4 miniGreenhouse
Three alternativesSAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
GreenhouseHeld
Two alternativesWorkday Recruiting, iCIMS
no first choice
Seven alternativesAvature, Greenhouse, Lever, Oracle Recruiting, Oracle Taleo, SmartRecruiters, iCIMS
against: SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting
SmartRecruiters
Two alternativesGreenhouse, iCIMS
no first choiceagainst: Lever, TalentReef, Workable
Gemini 3.5 FlashAshby, Greenhouse
One alternativeLever
against: Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
GreenhouseChanged
Three alternativesSmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
no first choice
Six alternativesAshby, Greenhouse, Lever, Pinpoint, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
against: SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting
Greenhouse
Two alternativesLever, Pinpoint
Greenhouse
Three alternativesSmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
against: Ashby
against: BambooHR, Breezy HR, Bullhorn, JazzHR, Loxo, Oracle Taleo, PCR, Recruitee, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workable, Workday Recruiting, legacy IBM Kenexa
Perplexity SonarGreenhouse
Five alternativesAvature, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
GreenhouseHeld
Four alternativesSAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, SmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
no first choice
Nine alternativesAvature, Darwinbox, Greenhouse, Oracle Taleo/Oracle HCM Recruiting, Phenom, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, SmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
against: Lever
Workable
One alternativeSmartRecruiters
against: Greenhouse
no first choiceagainst: AvaHR, Trakstar Hire, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Grok 4.1 FastGreenhouse
Two alternativesWorkday Recruiting, iCIMS
against: Oracle Taleo
Workday RecruitingChanged
Two alternativesGreenhouse, iCIMS
no first choiceWorkday Recruiting
Three alternativesGreenhouse, SmartRecruiters, iCIMS
against: JazzHR, Lever, Oracle Taleo/Fusion Recruiting, Recruitis
iCIMS
Three alternativesGreenhouse, Lever, Pinpoint
against: Cornerstone OnDemand, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Mistral SmallGreenhouse
Two alternativesLever, Pinpoint
iCIMSChanged
Five alternativesAvature, Greenhouse, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting
Greenhouse
Two alternativesDarwinbox, iCIMS
Greenhouse, Workable
Two alternativesWorkday Recruiting, iCIMS
no first choiceagainst: Cornerstone OnDemand, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
DeepSeek V4 FlashGreenhouse
Three alternativesAshby, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
iCIMSChanged
Two alternativesGreenhouse, Workday Recruiting
Greenhouse, iCIMS
Six alternativesAshby, Darwinbox, Lever, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, SmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting
iCIMS
One alternativeWorkable
against: Ashby, Greenhouse, Lever
no first choiceagainst: Cornerstone OnDemand / TalentLink, IBM Kenexa / BrassRing, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Llama 4 MaverickPinpoint
Two alternativesDarwinbox, Pin
Workday RecruitingChanged
Three alternativesGreenhouse, Pinpoint, iCIMS
no first choiceGreenhouse, Oracle Taleo, iCIMSPinpoint
Three alternativesJazzHR, Manatal, Personio
against: Oracle Taleo, Workday Recruiting
Qwen 3.7 FlashGreenhouse
Two alternativesSmartRecruiters, iCIMS
against: Workday Recruiting
iCIMSChanged
Five alternativesGreenhouse, Oracle Taleo, Rippling, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting
Workday Recruiting
Four alternativesGreenhouse, Lever, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, iCIMS
against: Oracle Taleo
JazzHR
Three alternativesGreenhouse, Lever, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting
no first choiceagainst: Breezy HR, JazzHR, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, ZipRecruiter
Kimi K2Greenhouse
Three alternativesPinpoint, SmartRecruiters, iCIMS
GreenhouseHeld
Four alternativesLever, SmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Greenhouse
Three alternativesLever, SmartRecruiters, iCIMS
against: Oracle Taleo/Recruiting Cloud, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting
iCIMS
One alternativeSmartRecruiters
against: Greenhouse, Lever, Workday Recruiting
no first choiceagainst: Workday Recruitingagainst: Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
GLM 4.7 FlashXGreenhouse
Six alternativesDarwinbox, Lever, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Workday RecruitingChanged
One alternativeGreenhouse
against: iCIMS
Greenhouse, iCIMS
Four alternativesAshby, Darwinbox, Gem, SmartRecruiters
against: Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting
Workday Recruiting
Three alternativesAvature, Lever, Workable
against: Greenhouse, Pinpoint, SmartRecruiters, iCIMS
no first choiceagainst: Greenhouse, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
MiniMax M2.5Greenhouse, Pinpoint
Three alternativesDarwinbox, Gem, iCIMS
Greenhouse, iCIMSChanged
One alternativeWorkday Recruiting
iCIMS
Six alternativesGreenhouse, Lever, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, SmartRecruiters, Workday Recruiting
no first choiceno first choiceagainst: Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, UKG Pro, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
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 17:22no04 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:06yes25 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:06yes1826 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:05yes206 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:11yes3318 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:22yes109 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:17yes2019 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:21yes53 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 16:57yes928 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:13yes1235 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:09yes1491 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:10yes737 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:00yes1510 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:12yes36 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:22yes721 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:07yes2018 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:17yes3418 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:07yes56 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:05yes1421 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:06yes53 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:16yes531 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:13yes1021 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:07yes1459 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:14yes516 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:00yes99 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:08yes58 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:17yes1530 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:20yes209 s
ComparativeGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:14yes2817 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 16:57yes1913 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 16:59yes2325 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 16:59yes52 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:03no041 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:16yes1530 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:02yes2276 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:01yes1564 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:06yes1710 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:05yes46 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:24yes2528 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:21yes208 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:08yes3820 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:07yes56 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-09-17 16:58yes2157 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:11yes54 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:09yes22162 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:19yes1529 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:16yes28246 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 17:07yes1893 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:01yes1815 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:08no010 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:13no019 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:08yes2022 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:08yes1919 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:04no07 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:06yes1931 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:17yes54 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 17:01no032 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:11yes1086 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:21yes1524 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 16:58no09 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:11yes2615 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:19yes68 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 17:10yes1927 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 17:06yes208 s
Negative framingGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 17:13yes2214 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 17:10yes149 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:20yes2626 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 17:05yes64 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 16:58yes1471 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:00yes2676 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:03yes1461 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 16:58yes923 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
ADP Recruiting Management read as ADP
Cornerstone read as Cornerstone OnDemand
LeverTRM read as Lever
LeverTRM Enterprise read as Lever
SAP SuccessFactors read as SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting
SAP SuccessFactors (Recruiting) read as SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting
UKG Pro Recruiting read as UKG Pro
Workday read as Workday Recruiting
Workday (Recruiting module) read as Workday Recruiting
Workday Talent Acquisition read as Workday Recruiting
Zoho read as Zoho Recruit
iCIMS Talent Cloud read as iCIMS
Unresolved, counted raw
Cornerstone OnDemand / TalentLink
IBM Kenexa / BrassRing
Oracle Taleo/Fusion Recruiting
Oracle Taleo/Oracle HCM Recruiting
Oracle Taleo/Recruiting Cloud
PCR (PCRecruiter)
TalentReef
legacy IBM Kenexa
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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