# Candidate assessment: what AI models recommend, September 2026

HR AI Recommendation Index, September 2026 Edition. Asked as "pre-employment assessment platform" and as "skills testing tool for hiring", six framings each, to twelve models with search on, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. Page: https://hr-ai-index.com/talent/candidate-assessment/

**Standing:** TestGorilla leads with 68% of first choices; verdict clear leader. 41 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| # | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | TestGorilla | 68% | 7% | 54 |
| 2 | Criteria Corp | 10% | 3% | 33 |
| 3 | Vervoe | 2% | 5% | 22 |
| 4 | Testlify | 2% | 0% | 13 |
| 5 | iMocha | 2% | 6% | 16 |
| 6 | The Predictive Index | 2% | 13% | 15 |
| 7 | HackerRank | 0% | 4% | 23 |
| 8 | Codility | 0% | 12% | 17 |
| 9 | Harver | 0% | 9% | 11 |
| 10 | HireVue | 0% | 20% | 10 |

## Each model's first choice on the direct prompt

- Claude Haiku 4.5: The Predictive Index; alternatives Criteria Corp, TestGorilla
- GPT-5.4 mini: TestGorilla; alternatives HireVue, Talogy
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: TestGorilla; alternatives Coderbyte, Criteria Corp, Intervue, The Predictive Index
- Perplexity Sonar: Criteria Corp; alternatives TestGorilla
- Grok 4.1 Fast: TestGorilla; alternatives Criteria Corp
- Mistral Small: TestGorilla; alternatives Adaface, Greenhouse, The Predictive Index
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: TestGorilla; alternatives Criteria Corp, The Predictive Index
- Llama 4 Maverick: TestGorilla
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: TestGorilla; alternatives CodeSignal, HireVue, Talmundo
- Kimi K2: Criteria Corp, TestGorilla; alternatives Plum, The Predictive Index
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Criteria Corp; alternatives Harver, Plum, TestGorilla
- MiniMax M2.5: SHL, TestGorilla; alternatives Test Partnership

## Sources the answers cite

66 of 72 answers came back with a source list, from 12 of 12 models. Sites named in the most answers:

- testgorilla.com: 27 answers, 42 citations
- testlify.com: 25 answers, 29 citations
- peoplemanagingpeople.com: 23 answers, 23 citations
- jobcannon.io: 21 answers, 28 citations
- testtrick.com: 20 answers, 35 citations
- firsthr.app: 19 answers, 21 citations
- criteriacorp.com: 15 answers, 23 citations
- pin.com: 15 answers, 15 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://jobcannon.io/compare/best-pre-employment-assessments (20 answers)
- https://peoplemanagingpeople.com/tools/best-pre-employment-testing-software (20 answers)
- https://pin.com/blog/pre-employment-assessment-tools (15 answers)
- https://firsthr.app/compare/hiring/pre-employment-assessment (14 answers)
- https://testtrick.com/blogs/hiring-assessment-tools-small-mid-sized-teams (14 answers)
- https://aihr.com/blog/top-pre-employment-assessment-tools (11 answers)
- https://bryq.com/blog/best-talent-assessment-platforms-2026 (11 answers)
- https://adaface.com/blog/pre-employment-assessment-tools (10 answers)
- https://getapp.com/hr-employee-management-software/pre-employment-testing/org/mid-size-business (10 answers)
- https://intervue.io/blog/best-pre-employment-testing-software (9 answers)

## Warned against

- ProctorU: 6 of 6 labels negative. "Reviewers describe the platform as “completely unreliable,” with frequent technical glitches, long wait times, and unhelpful support." (GLM 4.7 FlashX, negative prompt)
- TestGorilla: 4 of 54 labels negative. "Frequent complaints about buggy tests, irrelevant or erroneous questions, unrealistic time limits... steep pricing with rigid annual subscriptions, and poor customer support" (Grok 4.1 Fast, negative prompt)
- Honorlock: 3 of 4 labels negative. "Chrome-extension-only, which excludes many students; heavy AI monitoring ... creates frequent false positives" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt)
- Proctorio: 3 of 4 labels negative. "Repeatedly named in complaints over excessive biometric data collection and opaque AI." (DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt)

## Record

- Method: https://hr-ai-index.com/methodology/
- Raw judge labels and full responses: https://hr-ai-index.com/data/
- License: CC BY 4.0. Cite as HR AI Recommendation Index, September 2026 Edition, hr-ai-index.com.