HR AI Index
Index › Talent acquisition › Recruiting CRM › Enterprise › September 2026 Edition

Recruiting CRM and sourcing for enterprise buyers

Asked as “candidate sourcing tool”, and as “recruiting CRM”, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. 40 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing
Beamery
Contested
20% of first choices, contested.
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 businessPin23%ContestedStanding →Mid-marketLever20%ContestedStanding →EnterpriseBeamery20%ContestedThis page

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
01Beamery20%17%12accepted challenger
02SeekOut15%9%22accepted challenger
03LinkedIn Recruiter12%44%25criticized challenger
04Gem10%10%30accepted challenger
05Eightfold AI5%7%15accepted challenger
06hireEZ5%18%17accepted 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
Lever vs GemLever vs ManatalGem vs Manatal

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
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative40%
Key
01Beamery20%
02SeekOut15%
03LinkedIn Recruiter12%
04Gem10%
05Eightfold AI5%
06hireEZ5%

02What they warned about

One of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.4 mini, Gemini 3.5 Flash, Perplexity Sonar, Grok 4.1 Fast, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Qwen 3.7 Flash, Kimi K2, 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.
LinkedIn Recruiter
44%
11 of 25 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“Avoid **LinkedIn Recruiter Corporate** (~$900+/user/month)” Qwen 3.7 Flash, budget prompt
hireEZ
18%
3 of 17 labels negative · 3 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“What to AVOID for Predictable Costs ... HireEZ | ~$500-800/user/month” Kimi K2, budget prompt
Gem
10%
3 of 30 labels negative · 3 of 12 models
“Why it might fail you: While Gem is great for recruiters sending cold emails, it often lacks the sophisticated internal mobility features” Qwen 3.7 Flash, paraphrase prompt
Apollo.io
67%
2 of 3 labels negative · 2 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“Avoid ... **Credit-based tools** (e.g., Apollo, Lusha)” Qwen 3.7 Flash, budget 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

64 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. 930 links across 335 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

selectsoftwarereviews.com
vendor site · Select Software Reviews27 answers · 29 citations · 10 models
pin.com
vendor site · Pin24 answers · 57 citations · 9 models
metaview.ai
vendor site · Metaview24 answers · 26 citations · 10 models
leonar.app
vendor site · Leonar21 answers · 24 citations · 8 models
bestrecruitingtools.com
16 answers · 21 citations · 7 models
gem.com
vendor site · Gem14 answers · 16 citations · 8 models
intervue.io
vendor site · Intervue14 answers · 14 citations · 9 models
gartner.com
vendor site · Gartner13 answers · 26 citations · 9 models
guideflow.com
vendor site · Guideflow13 answers · 15 citations · 10 models
recruiterflow.com
vendor site · Recruiterflow13 answers · 15 citations · 7 models
juicebox.ai
vendor site · Juicebox12 answers · 14 citations · 7 models
noon.ai
vendor site · Noon10 answers · 20 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.

selectsoftwarereviews.com/buyer-guide/best-candidate-sourcing-tools
25 answers · 10 models
leonar.app/blog/best-talent-sourcing-platforms
16 answers · 8 models
intervue.io/blog/best-candidate-sourcing-software
13 answers · 9 models
metaview.ai/resources/blog/candidate-sourcing-tools
13 answers · 6 models
bestrecruitingtools.com/blog/best-candidate-sourcing-software-enterprise-2026
12 answers · 6 models
gem.com/blog/candidate-sourcing-software
12 answers · 7 models
pin.com/blog/candidate-sourcing-software
12 answers · 8 models
guideflow.com/blog/sourcing-software
10 answers · 9 models
pin.com/blog/candidate-sourcing-tools
10 answers · 7 models
sitepoint.com/best-sourcing-tools-for-recruiters
9 answers · 5 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 candidate sourcing tool for an enterprise B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which recruiting CRM would you recommend to a large B2B company with thousands of employees?”Comparative“What are the top enterprise-grade sourcing tools and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best candidate sourcing tool 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 a candidate sourcing tool. What should we look at?”Negative“Which sourcing tools should a large enterprise avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5no first choiceBeameryChanged
Two alternativesAvature, SmartRecruiters
no first choiceEightfold AI
One alternativeLinkedIn Recruiter
no first choicenothing named
GPT-5.4 miniLinkedIn Recruiter
Three alternativesEightfold AI, Phenom, iCIMS
AvatureChanged
Two alternativesBeamery, Salesforce Recruiting CRM
no first choiceSeekOutagainst: LinkedIn Recruiterno first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashGem
Three alternativesEightfold AI, SeekOut, hireEZ
BeameryChanged
Four alternativesAvature, Eightfold AI, Gem, Phenom
Gem, hireEZ
Three alternativesEightfold AI, LinkedIn Recruiter, SeekOut
Eightfold AI
Three alternativesGoPerfect, Pin, Teamtailor
against: Gem, LinkedIn Recruiter, SeekOutno first choicenothing named
Perplexity SonarSeekOut
Three alternativesCognism, Gem, Humanly
BeameryChanged
One alternativeAvature
no first choiceAvature
Two alternativesGem, SeekOut
against: LinkedIn Recruiterno first choiceagainst: Apollo.io, ZoomInfo
Grok 4.1 FastLinkedIn Recruiter
Two alternativesGem, hireEZ
against: BeameryBeameryChanged
Four alternativesEightfold AI, Lever, Oracle Fusion Recruiting, iCIMS
no first choiceLever
Two alternativesWorkday, iCIMS
against: Greenhouse, LinkedIn Recruiter, SeekOut, hireEZNoon
Four alternativesGem, Pin, SeekOut, hireEZ
against: LinkedIn Recruiter, SAP, SAP Ariba, ZoomInfo
Mistral SmallSeekOut
Four alternativesEightfold AI, Findem, Gem, hireEZ
BeameryChanged
Two alternativesBullhorn, Gem
SAP Ariba
One alternativeCoupa
Gem, LinkedIn Recruiter
Two alternativesEightfold AI, Findem
no first choicenothing named
DeepSeek V4 FlashLinkedIn Recruiter + Talent Insights, SeekOut
Two alternativesGem, hireEZ
iCIMSChanged
Four alternativesGem, Greenhouse, Lever, Workday Recruiting
against: SmartRecruitersno first choiceagainst: SAP AribaWorkable
Two alternativesGem, SeekOut
against: JazzHR, LinkedIn Recruiter, Loxono first choiceagainst: Oracle, SAP
Llama 4 Maverickno first choiceno first choiceHeldno first choiceGemno first choicenothing named
Qwen 3.7 FlashLinkedIn Recruiter
Six alternativesGem, Hireful, JobDiva, SeekOut, Sourcery, Sovren / Jibe.io
BeameryChanged
Two alternativesAvature, iCIMS
against: Bullhorn, Gemno first choiceGem
Two alternativesManatal, SeekOut
against: Apollo.io, ContactOut, Fetcher, LinkedIn Recruiter, Lushano first choicenothing named
Kimi K2SeekOut, hireEZ
One alternativeGem
against: LinkedIn RecruiterLever, SmartRecruitersChanged
Four alternativesBeamery, Gem, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
Coupa
Five alternativesGEP SMART, Ivalua, Jaggaer, SAP Ariba, Zycus
Workday Recruiting
Four alternatives100Hires, Oracle HCM Cloud, Pin, SAP SuccessFactors
against: Beamery, Eightfold AI, LinkedIn Recruiter, hireEZno first choice
Three alternativesGem, SeekOut, hireEZ
against: LinkedIn Recruiter, Noon, Pinnothing named
GLM 4.7 FlashXhireEZ
Three alternativesGem, Pin, SeekOut
against: LinkedIn RecruiterBeameryChanged
Three alternativesBullhorn, Greenhouse, Oracle Fusion Recruiting
SeekOut
Six alternativesEightfold AI, Gem, Hired, LinkedIn Recruiter, Mokka, Noon
LinkedIn Recruiter
One alternativeManatal
against: Findem, Gem, hireEZno first choiceagainst: Bullhorn, Oracle Taleo, SAP SuccessFactors, Workday Recruiting, iCIMS
MiniMax M2.5SeekOut
Three alternativesEightfold AI, Gem, LinkedIn Recruiter
BeameryChanged
Three alternativesGreenhouse, Metaview, iCIMS
no first choiceLever, SmartRecruiters, Workable
One alternativeWorkday Recruiting
no first choicenothing named
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 21:44no04 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 17:54yes34 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 18:43yes520 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:54yes206 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 21:20yes4018 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 18:56yes86 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 20:50yes1919 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 18:07yes84 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 20:34no033 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 20:26yes1021 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 19:33yes1398 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 18:21yes522 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 21:10yes97 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:05yes35 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 22:01yes1753 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:56yes205 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 19:30yes4019 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 18:05yes53 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 21:08yes1517 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 21:39yes53 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 18:45yes1368 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 20:13yes2028 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 20:15yes2561 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 21:27yes522 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 21:11yes1510 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 21:39yes410 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 21:58yes1047 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 18:38yes206 s
ComparativeGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 21:20yes2416 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 18:11yes56 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 18:29yes1923 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 21:40yes52 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 19:07yes550 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 19:55yes1730 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 21:12yes1042 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 20:05yes931 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 20:56yes1810 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:01yes35 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 22:06yes2768 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:10yes206 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 21:15yes5024 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 18:50yes79 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-09-17 19:39yes2562 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 21:22yes52 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 18:21yes882 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 19:47yes3050 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 18:45yes29132 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 20:11yes2060 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 20:24no06 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:04no09 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 19:27no017 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 18:53yes2010 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 18:48yes1716 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 19:00no09 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 17:58yes2733 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 21:36yes54 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 20:04yes1030 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 19:33yes1459 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 20:52yes1471 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 19:30no054 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 19:00yes2614 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 20:37yes56 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 22:04yes1556 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 20:15yes207 s
Negative framingGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-09-17 18:51yes3716 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 18:59yes56 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 19:48yes1921 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 18:11yes54 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 20:41no028 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 18:27yes2539 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 20:54yes2769 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 19:53yes2070 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
Apollo read as Apollo.io
Eightfold read as Eightfold AI
LeverTRM read as Lever
Oracle Fusion Cloud Recruiting read as Oracle Fusion Recruiting
iCIMS Talent Cloud read as iCIMS
Unresolved, counted raw
Arbi
Basware
Clearbit
Coupa Sourcing
Coupa Strategic Sourcing
Globality
Hireful
Kodiak Hub
LinkedIn Recruiter + Talent Insights
Salesforce Recruiting CRM
Seeking Alpha
Sourcery
Sovren / Jibe.io
Workday Strategic Sourcing
Zycus Merlin
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.
← Job advertisingRecruitment marketing →