# AI SDR agents: what AI models recommend, October 2026

Gane Index, October 2026 Edition. Asked as "AI SDR agent" and as "AI sales development tool that prospects and books meetings", six framings each, to fourteen models with search on, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/sales/ai-sdr-agents/2026-10

This is the permanent record of the October 2026 Edition, published October 1, 2026 and superseded since. The current standing: https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/sales/ai-sdr-agents/index.md

**Standing:** Apollo.io (tied with Artisan Ava) leads with 24% of first choices; verdict contested. 55 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| Rank | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | [Apollo.io](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/apollo-io/index.md) | 24% | 0% | 33 |
| 2 | [Artisan Ava](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/artisan-ava/index.md) | 24% | 26% | 53 |
| 3 | [AiSDR](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/aisdr/index.md) | 18% | 7% | 42 |
| 4 | [Regie.ai](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/regie-ai/index.md) | 5% | 11% | 19 |
| 5 | [Amplemarket Duo](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/amplemarket-duo/index.md) | 4% | 8% | 13 |
| 6 | [Instantly](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/instantly/index.md) | 4% | 20% | 10 |
| 7 | [Agent Frank](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/agent-frank/index.md) | 2% | 0% | 10 |
| 8 | [Salesforge Agent Frank](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/salesforge-agent-frank/index.md) | 2% | 14% | 14 |
| 9 | [Qualified Piper](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/qualified-piper/index.md) | 2% | 7% | 14 |
| 18 | [11x](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/11x/index.md) | 2% | 50% | 38 |
| 19 | [Reply.io Jason](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/reply-io-jason/index.md) | 0% | 6% | 16 |
| 20 | [Clay](https://www.gane.ai/index/gtm/vendors/clay/index.md) | 0% | 0% | 13 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 77 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: Artisan Ava; alternatives Jeeva, Persana AI, RocketSDR, Salesloft Rhythm
- GPT-5.4 mini: Apollo.io, Qualified Piper; alternatives Salesforce Agentforce SDR
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Amplemarket Duo; alternatives 11x, Artisan Ava, Clay, HubSpot Prospecting Agent
- Perplexity Sonar: Apollo.io; alternatives AiSDR, Amplemarket Duo, Regie.ai
- Grok 4.20: AiSDR, Artisan Ava; alternatives Apollo.io, Conversica, Reply.io Jason
- Mistral Small: Artisan Ava, Regie.ai; alternatives Conversica
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Artisan Ava; alternatives AiSDR, Clay
- Llama 4 Maverick: no first choice
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Salesforge Agent Frank; alternatives Apollo.io, Clay, ZoomInfo Copilot
- Kimi K2: Apollo.io; alternatives AiSDR, Artisan Ava, GTM Workspace, Regie.ai
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Laxis AI SDR; alternatives 11x Alice, AiSDR, Amplemarket Duo, Reply.io Jason
- MiniMax M2.5: AiSDR, Artisan Ava; alternatives Coldreach, Reply.io Jason, ZoomInfo Copilot
- GPT-6 Luna: Artisan Ava; alternatives AiSDR
- Muse Glimmer 30B: Artisan Ava; alternatives 11x Alice, Apollo.io

## Sources the answers cite

80 of 84 answers came back with a source list, from 14 of 14 models. Sites named in the most answers:

- salesforge.ai: 42 answers, 67 citations
- artisan.co: 40 answers, 57 citations
- pipeline.zoominfo.com: 26 answers, 46 citations
- aisdr.com: 23 answers, 43 citations
- amplemarket.com: 23 answers, 27 citations
- getvoip.com: 20 answers, 20 citations
- 11x.ai: 19 answers, 29 citations
- coldreach.ai: 19 answers, 21 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://salesforge.ai/blog/ai-sales-agents (34 answers)
- https://artisan.co/blog/the-best-ai-sdrs (29 answers)
- https://amplemarket.com/blog/best-ai-sales-agents (23 answers)
- https://getvoip.com/ai-sdr-agents (20 answers)
- https://pipeline.zoominfo.com/sales/ai-sdr-tools (20 answers)
- https://coldreach.ai/blog/ai-sales-agents-for-b2b-outreach (14 answers)
- https://pipeline.zoominfo.com/sales/ai-sdr-for-outbound-sales (10 answers)
- https://heygen.com/blog/best-ai-sdr-tools (8 answers)
- https://learn.g2.com/best-ai-sales-assistant-software (8 answers)
- https://salesforge.ai/blog/ai-sales-tools (8 answers)

## Warned against

- 11x: 19 of 38 labels negative. "11x had been listing companies as customers that were not customers, with ZoomInfo's lawyer threatening legal action" (Claude Haiku 4.5, negative prompt)
- Artisan Ava: 14 of 53 labels negative. "Artisan faced platform-level enforcement including a LinkedIn ban ... Artisan reviews and third-party reports document concerns around zero quality leads despite high outreach volume" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)
- AiSDR: 3 of 42 labels negative. "they appear more specialized and less universally established than Apollo or Qualified" (GPT-5.4 mini, direct prompt)
- Instantly: 2 of 10 labels negative. "Avoid if you want an *agent* that thinks and responds; this is just a high-volume sender." (Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt)

## Movement since September 2026

Floor: 11 points of share, measured on the calibration repeat.
Same leader: Apollo.io at 27%.

- AiSDR: 2% to 17%, +15. Cleared the floor by 4 points · rank 9 → 3 of 70.
- Amplemarket Duo: 17% to 4%, −13. Cleared the floor by 2 points · rank 2 → 5 of 70.
- Artisan Ava: 13% to 21%, +8. Inside the floor by 3 points · rank 3 → 2 of 70.
- Apollo.io: 20% to 27%, +7. Inside the floor by 4 points · rank 1 of 70, unchanged.
- Regie.ai: 0% to 6%, +6. Inside the floor by 5 points · rank 22 → 4 of 70.
- Salesforge Agent Frank: 4% to 2%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 5 → 9 of 70.
- 11x: 0% to 2%, +2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 62 → 16 of 70.
- Reply.io Jason: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 10 → 17 of 70.
- Agent Frank: 2% to 2%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 12 → 7 of 70.
- Qualified Piper: 2% to 2%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 11 → 8 of 70.
- Clay: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 21 → 18 of 70.
- Salesforce Agentforce SDR: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 23 → 19 of 70.

## Record

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