September 2026 Edition, published · The permanent record of that edition, superseded since. The current standing is on the category page →
Index › Finance › Equity and corporate › Cap table management › Small business · September 2026 Edition

Cap table management for small business buyers

Asked as “cap table management software”, and as “equity management platform”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 56 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing · first-choice share
30%
Contested · Cake Equity 20%
30Pulley20Cake Equity16Carta Equity34others

30% 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
01Pulley30%18%57endorsed leader
02Cake Equity20%0%44accepted challenger
03Eqvista16%7%41accepted challenger
04Carta Equity16%44%62criticized challenger
05Qapita5%7%15accepted challenger
Show the one product at 0%, ordered by negative rate
06Ledgy0%3%29accepted 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
C04
05
06
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative50%
Key
01Pulley30%
02Cake Equity20%
03Eqvista16%
04Carta Equity16%
05Qapita5%
06Ledgy0%

What 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 4.20, Mistral Small, 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.
Carta Equity
44%
27 of 62 labels negative · 11 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“Avoid Carta unless your investors explicitly demand it” GLM 4.7 FlashX, negative prompt
Pulley
18%
10 of 57 labels negative · 7 of 12 models · 6 hard negative
“You should avoid signing up for Pulley, and if you are currently using it, you need to initiate a migration immediately.” Gemini 3.5 Flash, direct prompt
Shareworks
67%
6 of 9 labels negative · 5 of 12 models · 4 hard negative
“Shareworks may not be suitable for small businesses or early-stage startups due to its complexity and higher cost” Mistral Small, negative prompt
AngelList Stack
83%
5 of 6 labels negative · 4 of 12 models · 5 hard negative
“stopped accepting new customers in August 2026, so it's no longer a viable choice for new teams” Kimi K2, comparative 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

63 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. 903 links across 165 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

vendor site · Cake Equity57 answers · 70 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Eqvista41 answers · 61 citations · 12 models
vendor site · Guideflow38 answers · 42 citations · 11 models
34 answers · 34 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Qapita33 answers · 50 citations · 11 models
28 answers · 28 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Pulley25 answers · 43 citations · 10 models
22 answers · 27 citations · 9 models
vendor site · Carta21 answers · 23 citations · 11 models
vendor site · G219 answers · 19 citations · 11 models
17 answers · 19 citations · 7 models
17 answers · 17 citations · 9 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 cap table management software”, “cap table management software”, “cap table platforms”. 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
Pulley pulley.com30%17349,50026,01322,480372
Cake cakeequity.com
Cake Equity 20%
20%847201213,070242
Eqvista eqvista.com16%121720695,715427
Carta Equity carta.com16%206506,905$2,839291
Qapita qapita.com5%66720417,649$12211
Mantle withmantle.com5%1560,50019,77543613
Gust gust.com
Gust Equity Management 2%
2%6
CapTableFree2%
Capbase capbase.com2%9
Sigfig2%

Google's top ten for the three searches hold 20 sites; 5 of them are among the sites the models cited here (cakeequity.com, carta.com, cheqly.com, eqvista.com, pulley.com). The first result for “best cap table management software” is threads.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 cap table management software for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which equity management platform would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top cap table platforms for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best cap table management software for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating a cap table management software. What should we look at?”Negative“Which cap table platforms should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5Mantle
Two alternativesCake Equity, EquityList
against: Carta Equity
Cake Equity, EqvistaChanged
One alternativePulley
against: Carta Equity
Cake Equity, Pulley
Two alternativesEqvista, Ledgy
Cake Equity, Gust Equity Management
Two alternativesEquityList, Mantle
no first choiceagainst: Carta Equity, Pulley
GPT-5.4 miniEqvista
One alternativeCarta Equity
against: Pulley
Carta Equity, PulleyChanged
Two alternativesLedgy, Shareworks
Eqvista, Pulley
Two alternativesCarta Equity, Ledgy
Carta Equity, Eqvistaagainst: Pulleyno first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashCarta Equity
Four alternativesCake Equity, Eqvista, Ledgy, Mantle
against: Pulley
PulleyChanged
Three alternativesCake Equity, Carta Equity, Eqvista
Mantle
Three alternativesCake Equity, Fidelity Private Shares, Pulley
against: Carta Equity
Mantle
Four alternativesCake Equity, Carta Equity, Eqvista, Fidelity Private Shares
against: Pulley
Cake Equity, Carta Equity
Two alternativesEqvista, Ledgy
against: AngelList Stack, Pulley
against: Carta Equity, Certent Equity Management, LTSE Equity, Shareworks, Spreadsheets
Perplexity SonarPulley
Two alternativesCarta Equity, Qapita
QapitaChanged
Two alternativesCarta Equity, Eqvista
Cake Equity, Pulley
Three alternativesCarta Equity, Eqvista, Mantle
Cake Equity, Eqvistaagainst: Carta Equityno first choiceagainst: Carta Equity
Grok 4.20Cake Equity, Eqvista
Two alternativesCarta Equity, Pulley
Cake EquityChangedagainst: Carta Equity, Pulleyno first choiceagainst: AngelList StackEqvista
Five alternativesCake Equity, Capboard, Carta Equity, Fidelity Private Shares, Ledgy
Cake Equity, Pulleyagainst: Carta Equityagainst: AngelList Stack, Carta Equity, Shareworks
Mistral SmallPulley
Two alternativesCake Equity, Carta Equity
Cake EquityChanged
One alternativeQapita
Cake Equity, Pulley
One alternativeLedgy
against: Carta Equity
Cake Equity, Pulley
One alternativeLedgy
no first choiceagainst: Carta Equityagainst: Carta Equity, Shareworks
DeepSeek V4 FlashPulley
Three alternativesCake Equity, Eqvista, Gust Equity Management
against: Carta Equity
PulleyHeld
Two alternativesCake Equity, Qapita
against: Carta Equity
Carta Equity, Eqvista, Pulley
Two alternativesCake Equity, Ledgy
against: Shareworks
Carta Equity, Eqvista
One alternativePulley
Cake Equity, Pulleyagainst: Carta Equityagainst: AngelList Stack, Carta Equity, Eqvista, Shareworks
Llama 4 MaverickPulley
One alternativeCarta Equity
QapitaChanged
Two alternativesCake Equity, Pulley
Pulley
Four alternativesCake Equity, Carta Equity, Eqvista, Ledgy
Cake Equity
Two alternativesCapshare, Pulley
no first choiceagainst: Carta Equity, Eqvista, Ledgy, Pulley
Qwen 3.7 FlashPulley
Two alternativesCarta Equity, Eqvista
CapbaseChanged
Two alternativesPulley, Qapita
against: Carta Equity
Pulley
Three alternativesCake Equity, Carta Equity, Eqvista
Mantle
Two alternativesCapboard, Eqvista
against: Carta Equity
Pulley, Sigfigagainst: Carta Equityagainst: Astrella, Carta Equity, J.P. Morgan Workplace Solutions, QuickBooks, Xero
Kimi K2Carta Equity, Pulley
One alternativeEqvista
PulleyChanged
Three alternativesAngelList Stack, Carta Equity, Fidelity Private Shares
Carta Equity, Pulley
Three alternativesCake Equity, Eqvista, Ledgy
against: AngelList Stack
Carta Equity
Two alternativesCake Equity, Eqvista
against: Pulley
Eqvista, Pulley
Three alternativesCake Equity, Fidelity Private Shares, Ledgy
against: Carta Equity
against: Carta Equity, Excel/Google Sheets, Qapita
GLM 4.7 FlashXPulley
Two alternativesCake Equity, Carta Equity
against: Eqvista
QapitaChanged
Two alternativesCake Equity, Carta Equity
Carta Equity, Pulley
Three alternativesCake Equity, Eqvista, Ledgy
CapTableFree, Eqvista
Five alternativesCake Equity, Carta Equity, Fidelity Private Shares, Pulley, Story.law
no first choiceagainst: Astrella, Carta Equity, Shareworks
MiniMax M2.5Carta Equity
One alternativeCake Equity
PulleyChanged
One alternativeQapita
against: Carta Equity
Cake Equity
Four alternativesCapboard, Carta Equity, Ledgy, Pulley
Carta Equity
Two alternativesCake Equity, OpenCap Stack
no first choiceagainst: Carta Equity, Pulley
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 19:51yes98 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:51yes45 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 19:46yes1424 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:50yes156 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 18:16yes3016 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 19:33yes67 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 20:21yes1519 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 19:16yes53 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 20:43no027 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 18:41yes1020 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 20:24yes2289 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 20:43yes623 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 17:59yes98 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:50no03 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 18:08yes1221 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:15yes204 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 20:53yes2316 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 18:45yes54 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 21:07yes1716 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 20:45yes53 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 19:21yes1543 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 17:56yes1046 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 18:53yes17260 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 19:02yes1337 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 20:21yes1611 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:25yes56 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 18:04yes1726 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 19:40yes208 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 19:08yes3217 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 19:32yes59 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-09-17 18:15yes2354 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 18:41yes53 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 18:34yes520 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 20:53yes1335 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 18:28yes1538 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 21:04yes823 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 18:25yes99 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:51yes35 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 18:02yes2827 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 18:29yes205 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 18:56yes3120 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 18:01yes54 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 20:50yes910 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 19:16yes52 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 20:04yes1633 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 20:40yes935 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 19:08yes2675 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 19:00yes914 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 18:51no07 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 18:02no06 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 21:19yes1659 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 20:59yes207 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 18:49yes1212 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 21:08no011 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-09-17 19:43yes2235 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 20:56yes54 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 18:54no031 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 19:23yes852 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 20:32no015 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 19:23no014 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 20:43yes139 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 19:29no04 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 19:26yes2220 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 21:03yes205 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 17:54yes3918 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 20:29yes56 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 18:31yes2754 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 20:12yes53 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 18:20yes1537 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 20:00yes1449 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 17:56yes25104 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 20:20yes1944 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
AngelList read as AngelList Stack
Carta read as Carta Equity
Carta (Launch Plan) read as Carta Equity
Carta (Self-Serve) read as Carta Equity
Carta Launch read as Carta Equity
Certent read as Certent Equity Management
Manual Spreadsheets (Excel / Google Sheets) read as Spreadsheets
Unresolved, counted raw
CapTableFree
Cheqly
Pledge
Sigfig
Story.law (Aegis)
Vettafee
Waveup
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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