# Financial modeling and scenario planning for small business buyers: what AI models recommend, September 2026

Gane Index, September 2026 Edition. Asked as "financial modeling software" and as "scenario planning tool for finance", six framings each, to twelve models with search on, on behalf of a small B2B company. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/planning/financial-modeling-and-scenario-planning/2026-09/smb

This is the permanent record of the September 2026 Edition, published September 17, 2026 and superseded since. The current standing: https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/planning/financial-modeling-and-scenario-planning/smb/index.md

**Standing:** Clockwork leads with 12% of first choices; verdict contested. 50 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| Rank | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | [Clockwork](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/clockwork/index.md) | 12% | 0% | 15 |
| 2 | [LivePlan](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/liveplan/index.md) | 10% | 0% | 13 |
| 4 | [Google Sheets](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/google-sheets/index.md) | 8% | 31% | 13 |
| 5 | [Fathom](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/fathom/index.md) | 6% | 3% | 29 |
| 6 | [Cube](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/cube/index.md) | 6% | 11% | 19 |
| 7 | [Finmark](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/finmark/index.md) | 6% | 12% | 16 |
| 8 | [Jirav](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/jirav/index.md) | 6% | 26% | 23 |
| 9 | [Forecastr](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/forecastr/index.md) | 6% | 8% | 12 |
| 10 | [Microsoft Excel](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/microsoft-excel/index.md) | 6% | 36% | 22 |
| 14 | [Datarails](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/datarails/index.md) | 2% | 6% | 16 |
| 20 | [Causal](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/causal/index.md) | 0% | 10% | 10 |
| 21 | [Runway](https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/vendors/runway/index.md) | 0% | 10% | 10 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 116 products named; products with the same share are tied, and the order among them carries no meaning. The table lists those with at least 10 labels.

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

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Drivetrain; alternatives Cube, Fathom, Jirav, LivePlan
- GPT-5.4 mini: Datarails, Fathom; alternatives LiveFlow, Planful
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Clockwork; alternatives Causal, Jirav, LiveFlow, Runway
- Perplexity Sonar: Clockwork; alternatives Datarails, LiveFlow
- Grok 4.20: Jirav; alternatives Cube, Datarails, Finmark, LivePlan
- Mistral Small: BILL, Forecastr; alternatives Fathom
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Finmark; alternatives Coefficient, Fathom, Forecastr
- Llama 4 Maverick: Forecastr; alternatives BILL, Farseer
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Excel/Google Sheets; alternatives Cube, Flare Finance, Float, LivePlan
- Kimi K2: BILL, Fathom; alternatives Causal, Google Sheets / Excel, Jirav, LivePlan
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Finmark; alternatives Budgyt, Cube, Datarails, Excel/Google Sheets
- MiniMax M2.5: Finmark, Forecastr; alternatives Datarails, LiveFlow, PlanGuru, Vena

## 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:

- fathomhq.com: 39 answers, 42 citations
- farseer.com: 30 answers, 33 citations
- cubesoftware.com: 29 answers, 41 citations
- drivetrain.ai: 25 answers, 30 citations
- worldmetrics.org: 20 answers, 39 citations
- productive.io: 20 answers, 20 citations
- datarails.com: 18 answers, 19 citations
- clockwork.ai: 17 answers, 28 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://fathomhq.com/blog/the-6-best-financial-modelling-software-tools (37 answers)
- https://farseer.com/blog/financial-modeling-tools (25 answers)
- https://cubesoftware.com/blog/financial-modeling-software (21 answers)
- https://drivetrain.ai/solutions/financial-modeling-software (20 answers)
- https://productive.io/blog/financial-modeling-software (19 answers)
- https://datarails.com/best-financial-modeling-software (18 answers)
- https://clockwork.ai/blog/best-fpa-software-small-business (17 answers)
- https://compassapp.ai/compare/best-financial-modelling-software-2026 (12 answers)
- https://skyvia.com/blog/top-data-modeling-tools (12 answers)
- https://autymate.com/blog/best-financial-modeling-software-in-2026-top-10-tools-with-pricing (10 answers)

## Warned against

- Anaplan: 13 of 15 labels negative. "Avoid unless you have a dedicated finance team and $50M+ in revenue.... Anaplan starts around $30,000+/year" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt)
- Microsoft Excel: 8 of 22 labels negative. "Creating large, interconnected financial models from scratch in Excel is high-risk." (Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt)
- Workday Adaptive Planning: 6 of 7 labels negative. "Avoid unless you have a dedicated finance team and $50M+ in revenue.... Workday Adaptive is often $15,000–$20,000+/month" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt)
- Jirav: 6 of 23 labels negative. "Often quoted starting around $10,000/year ... requires a dedicated in-house finance professional" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, budget prompt)

## Record

- Method: https://www.gane.ai/index/finance/methodology
- License: CC BY 4.0. Cite as Gane Index, September 2026 Edition, www.gane.ai/index/finance.