September 2026 Edition, published · The permanent record of that edition, superseded since. The current standing is on the category page →
Index › Finance › Accounting and close › Financial consolidation › Small business · September 2026 Edition

Financial consolidation for small business buyers

Asked as “financial consolidation software”, and as “multi-entity consolidation tool”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 51 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing · first-choice share
25%
Contested · Fathom 14%
25Joiin14Fathom12Centage Planning Maestro49others

25% of first choices, contested.

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.

The standing

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all twelve models, for a small B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01Joiin25%0%26accepted challenger
02Fathom14%0%31accepted challenger
03Centage Planning Maestro12%10%21accepted challenger
04LiveFlow10%0%15accepted challenger
05Datarails10%0%15accepted challenger
06Cube6%12%16accepted challenger
07QuickBooks Online4%25%12criticized challenger
08Sage Intacct2%38%16criticized challenger
Show the two products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
10OneStream0%56%16criticized challenger
09Oracle NetSuite0%47%17criticized challenger
Bars are the share of first choices, 0 to 100Every product with at least 10 labels here. Every product name links to its product page.
Head to headHead-to-head pages are published for mid-market buyers, so these open on mid-market figures, not small business.
All twenty-eight head-to-head pages: the top eight products, each against each

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
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative40%
Key
01Joiin25%
02Fathom14%
03Centage Planning Maestro12%
04LiveFlow10%
05Datarails10%
06Cube6%
07QuickBooks Online4%
08Sage Intacct2%
09Oracle NetSuite0%
10OneStream0%

What they warned about

One of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.4 mini, Perplexity Sonar, Grok 4.20, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, 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.
OneStream
56%
9 of 16 labels negative · 8 of 12 models · 4 hard negative
“enterprise-grade financial consolidation platforms (like OneStream or Oracle Hyperion) are far too expensive, complex, and slow to implement” Gemini 3.5 Flash, direct prompt
Oracle NetSuite
47%
8 of 17 labels negative · 4 of 12 models · 3 hard negative
“the most expensive mistake you can make is trying to migrate to an enterprise ERP system (like NetSuite or Sage Intacct) just to handle multi-entity consolidation” Gemini 3.5 Flash, budget prompt
Oracle Hyperion
100%
4 of 4 labels negative · 3 of 12 models · 3 hard negative
“enterprise-grade financial consolidation platforms (like OneStream or Oracle Hyperion) are far too expensive, complex, and slow to implement” Gemini 3.5 Flash, direct prompt
Sage Intacct
38%
6 of 16 labels negative · 3 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“you don't want the enterprise-tier consolidation platforms (like NetSuite OneWorld or Sage Intacct) that can run $50,000–$200,000+ per year” DeepSeek V4 Flash, budget prompt

What they cite

Twelve of the twelve models returned a source list in this edition: four return the pages they cited and eight the search results they consulted.

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. 828 links across 247 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

43 answers · 54 citations · 11 models
vendor site · HighRadius42 answers · 45 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Prophix28 answers · 29 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Consolidate.io24 answers · 28 citations · 9 models
23 answers · 25 citations · 9 models
vendor site · Datarails22 answers · 23 citations · 9 models
vendor site · Cubesoftware18 answers · 24 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Joiin14 answers · 24 citations · 7 models
14 answers · 17 citations · 9 models
vendor site · LiveFlow14 answers · 16 citations · 10 models
vendor site · G212 answers · 18 citations · 8 models
11 answers · 11 citations · 7 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.

Search against answers

Each company's standing in the answers beside its site's footprint in Google search, one row a site: the products the models named on it with their shares, and the share they add up to; monthly searches on Google, and DataForSEO's estimate of AI search demand (modeled from search signals, directional, not a count of queries to any assistant), for the most-searched of the company's and its products' names (the name is in each row's hover text); estimated monthly organic visits to the site; and its best position in Google's top ten for “best financial consolidation software”, “consolidation tools”, “financial consolidation software”. US estimates from DataForSEO and Google's Ads Transparency Center. A small company's site, or a mid-sized company's site for its flagship, is marked company; a product on a large parent's site (Google, Microsoft) has no site figures. A column with no figures for this category is left out, and an empty cell means none were seen, not none exist. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.
Company and productsShareOwn site citedName searches, GoogleAI search demand, est.Organic visitsPaid search a month, est.Google ads, last 30 daysBest Google position
Joiin joiin.co25%63590415206
Fathom fathomhq.com14%19090,5006,65774,88138
Centage centage.com
Centage Planning Maestro 12%
12%341,000111,692 company6
LiveFlow liveflow.com10%521,3001994,84644
Datarails datarails.com10%3746,60013418,964$16,697107
Cube cubesoftware.com6%30490,500152,613168,76413
QuickBooks quickbooks.ninja
QuickBooks Online 4%
4%6921,000,00054,681253 company
Consolidate.io consolidate.io
JustConsolidate 2%, Consolidate.io 2%
4%3
Prophix prophix.com2%2491,6004114,138$109103
Zoho zoho.com
Zoho Books 2%
2%36727,1002681,216,894 company$51,031119

Google's top ten for the three searches hold 20 sites; 5 of them are among the sites the models cited here (consolidate.io, highradius.com, joiin.co, liveflow.com, reddit.com). The first result for “best financial consolidation software” is gartner.com.

How 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.
ShowHide
ModelDirect“What is the best financial consolidation software for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which multi-entity consolidation tool would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top consolidation tools for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best financial consolidation software for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating a financial consolidation software. What should we look at?”Negative“Which consolidation tools should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5Fathom
Two alternativesCentage Planning Maestro, Cube
Joiin, LiveFlowChanged
One alternativeFathom
Centage Planning Maestro
Four alternativesBlackLine, Fluence Technologies, HighRadius, Quick Consols
against: Vena
Joiin
Four alternativesCentage Planning Maestro, Fathom, Planful, Rephop
no first choiceagainst: Vena
GPT-5.4 miniMicrosoft Dynamics 365 Business Central
One alternativeOracle NetSuite
against: Oracle Financial Consolidation and Close
QuickBooks OnlineChanged
Two alternativesOracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct
against: Xero
Fivetran
Three alternativesAirbyte, Hevo Data, Rivery
against: Stitch
Joiin
One alternativePlanGuru
against: OneStream, Oracle Fusion Cloud EPM
no first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashJoiin
Four alternativesFathom, G-Accon, LiveFlow, Syft Analytics
against: OneStream, Oracle Hyperion
JoiinHeld
Five alternativesCampfire, Fathom, LiveFlow, Rillet, Syft Analytics
against: Oracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct
LiveFlow
Three alternativesFathom, Finstack, Syft Analytics
Joiin, JustConsolidate
Two alternativesG-Accon, Syft Analytics
against: Oracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct
LiveFlow
Five alternativesFathom, G-Accon, Gather.nexus, Joiin, Syft Analytics
against: OneStream, Oracle Fusion Cloud EPM, Planful
against: Excel/Google Sheets, Oracle, SAP
Perplexity SonarDatarails
Two alternativesCentage Planning Maestro, QuickBooks Online
FathomChanged
Six alternativesAcumatica Cloud ERP, Intuit Enterprise Suite, Oracle NetSuite, QuickBooks Desktop, Sage Intacct, Zoho Books
Joiin, JustConsolidate
Three alternativesCentage Planning Maestro, Cube, Prophix
against: OneStream
Consolidate.io
Two alternativesFathom, Quick Consols
against: Centage Planning Maestro
no first choicenothing named
Grok 4.20Datarails
Three alternativesCentage Planning Maestro, Cube, Fathom
against: OneStream, Planful
FathomChanged
Two alternativesQuickBooks Desktop, Sage Intacct
Centage Planning Maestro, Fathom
Three alternativesCube, Datarails, Joiin
Joiin
One alternativeFathom
against: Centage Planning Maestro, QuickBooks Online, Wave
Datarails
Six alternativesBlackLine, Cube, Fathom, OneStream, Prophix, Workiva
against: Oracle Hyperion
against: Google Sheets, Microsoft Excel, Oracle Hyperion, SAP BPC
Mistral SmallCentage Planning MaestroCube, TRESIOChanged
One alternativeVena
against: Anaplan Financial Consolidation, OneStream
no first choice
Two alternativesHighRadius, Joiin
Cube
Two alternativesDatarails, Joiin
no first choiceagainst: Oracle Hyperionnothing named
DeepSeek V4 FlashJoiin
Two alternativesFathom, LiveFlow
against: Cube, OneStream, Oracle
Joiin, LiveFlowChanged
Three alternativesFathom, QuickBooks Online, Zoho Books
against: Flow ERP, Oracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct
Fathom, Joiin
Five alternativesCentage Planning Maestro, Cube, Datarails, Oracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct
against: Plain Spreadsheets, QuickBooks Online, Vena
Joiin
Five alternativesFathom, LiveFlow, QuickBooks Online, ScaleXP, switchbooks
against: Oracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct
FloQast, Lucanetagainst: Oracle NetSuite, SAP Business One
Llama 4 MaverickCentage Planning Maestro
Three alternativesFathom, HighRadius, Prophix
no first choiceChangedno first choiceJoiin
Three alternativesFathom, QuickBooks Online, Zoho Books with Zoho Analytics
no first choicenothing named
Qwen 3.7 FlashCentage Planning Maestro
Three alternativesCube, Datarails, Quick Consols
CubeChanged
Two alternativesLiveFlow, Sage Intacct
against: Oracle NetSuite
no first choiceFathom
Two alternativesMicrosoft Excel, Vena
against: Oracle, SAP
Datarails
Six alternativesCentage Planning Maestro, Coefficient, Cube, Joiin, Oracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct
against: OneStream, SAP Group Reporting
against: Google Sheets, Microsoft Excel, Monday.com, Notion, Oracle NetSuite, SAP Business One
Kimi K2Fathom, Joiin
Two alternativesOneFinOps, PivotXL
Sage IntacctChanged
Two alternativesOracle NetSuite, Xero
against: QuickBooks Online
Cube
Four alternativesCentage Planning Maestro, Datarails, Fathom, Joiin
against: Vena
Centage Planning Maestro, Joiin
One alternativeFathom
against: Cube
no first choicenothing named
GLM 4.7 FlashXCentage Planning Maestro, Fathom
Three alternativesDatarails, Spotlight Reporting, Workday Adaptive Planning
against: Sage Intacct
FathomChanged
One alternativeLiveFlow
against: Acumatica Cloud ERP, Oracle NetSuite, Sage Intacct
Fathom, HighRadius
Two alternativesOneStream, Prophix
LiveFlow, QuickBooks Online
One alternativeExcel/Google Sheets
against: CCH Tagetik, OneStream
no first choicenothing named
MiniMax M2.5Centage Planning Maestro, DatarailsLiveFlowChanged
Three alternativesFathom, Fuelfinance, Syft Analytics
Centage Planning Maestro, Cube, Joiin
One alternativeDatarails
Wave, Zoho Books
One alternativeJoiin
Prophix
Two alternativesPlanful, Vena
nothing named
Bold is the first choiceAlternatives are counted; the count opens them.What the answer argued against

The record

One row per call: the version string exactly as returned, whether the model searched, sources cited, and latency.
Seventy-two rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
PromptModelVersion stringTime (UTC)SearchedSourcesLatency
Direct recommendationClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 18:05yes97 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 20:39yes36 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 21:53yes1446 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:58yes205 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 18:55yes2015 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 20:45yes54 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 21:01yes2522 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 21:07yes52 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 18:11yes933 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 20:51yes1325 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 20:09yes1149 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 20:06yes513 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 20:20yes98 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:23no02 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 21:55yes555 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 18:51yes177 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 19:21yes3016 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 21:03yes56 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 18:10yes814 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 19:37yes54 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 19:38yes1036 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 18:46yes1018 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 19:09yes1282 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 18:01yes1053 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 20:08yes99 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:02yes310 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 19:31yes1426 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 18:00yes2011 s
ComparativeGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 21:04yes3121 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 20:48yes56 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-09-17 20:05yes2168 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 21:07yes51 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 20:16no030 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 18:05yes1666 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 19:49yes1287 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 20:11yes1343 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 19:41yes99 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:07yes45 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 18:47yes2719 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 21:04yes206 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 18:10yes2914 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 20:55yes55 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 18:41yes2317 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 18:41yes52 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 21:09no028 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 20:07yes924 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 19:13yes2887 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 21:06yes1325 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 21:07no06 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 20:32no05 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 21:55yes1163 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:51yes208 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 18:46yes1310 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 21:07no07 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 21:06yes724 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 18:50yes53 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 18:32yes926 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 20:38yes925 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 20:53yes14122 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 18:57yes524 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:54yes97 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 18:38yes26 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 18:16yes1821 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:13yes206 s
Negative framingGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 18:47yes3117 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 19:25yes56 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 18:36yes1932 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 18:18yes53 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 18:51no031 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 18:55yes1524 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 19:24yes1573 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 18:11yes1554 s

Normalization in this category

Every judgment call made between the raw labels and the numbers above, listed so it is visible and reversible.

ShowHide
Category-scoped readings
Acumatica read as Acumatica Cloud ERP
Adaptive Insights read as Workday Adaptive Planning
Anaplan read as Anaplan Financial Consolidation
Centage read as Centage Planning Maestro
Excel read as Microsoft Excel
Excel (with Power Query) read as Microsoft Excel
Fluence read as Fluence Technologies
Hevo read as Hevo Data
Host Analytics read as Planful
NetSuite read as Oracle NetSuite
Oracle EPM read as Oracle Fusion Cloud EPM
Prophix One read as Prophix
QuickBooks read as QuickBooks Online
QuickBooks Enterprise read as QuickBooks Online
QuickBooks Online consolidation tools read as QuickBooks Online
SAP Group Reporting read as SAP Group Reporting
Syft read as Syft Analytics
Vena Solutions read as Vena
Workday Adaptive read as Workday Adaptive Planning
Unresolved, counted raw
Emerge
Finstack
Keboola
Plain Spreadsheets (Excel/Google Sheets)
Rivery
TRESIO
Zoho Books with Zoho Analytics
switchbooks
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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