# Compensation benchmarking data for enterprise buyers: what AI models recommend, September 2026

Gane Index, September 2026 Edition. Asked as "salary benchmarking data provider" and as "compensation survey data", six framings each, to twelve models with search on, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/rewards/compensation-benchmarking-data/2026-09/enterprise

This is the permanent record of the September 2026 Edition, published September 17, 2026 and superseded since.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/hr/rewards/compensation-benchmarking-data/enterprise/index.md

**Standing:** Mercer Total Remuneration Survey leads with 30% of first choices; verdict contested. 61 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| Rank | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | [Mercer Total Remuneration Survey](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/mercer-total-remuneration-survey/index.md) | 30% | 14% | 37 |
| 2 | [Radford](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/radford/index.md) | 16% | 12% | 24 |
| 3 | [Willis Towers Watson](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/willis-towers-watson/index.md) | 11% | 14% | 22 |
| 4 | [Pave](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/pave/index.md) | 8% | 21% | 19 |
| 5 | [Korn Ferry Pay](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/korn-ferry-pay/index.md) | 5% | 6% | 17 |
| 6 | [Salary.com CompAnalyst](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/salary-com-companalyst/index.md) | 5% | 11% | 19 |
| 7 | [Payscale](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/payscale/index.md) | 3% | 24% | 21 |
| 9 | [Ravio](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/ravio/index.md) | 2% | 20% | 15 |
| 20 | [Deloitte](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/deloitte/index.md) | 0% | 8% | 12 |
| 21 | [Gartner](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/gartner/index.md) | 0% | 21% | 14 |
| 23 | [Bain & Company](https://www.gane.ai/index/hr/vendors/bain-company/index.md) | 0% | 18% | 11 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 125 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: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Radford; alternatives Culpepper Compensation Surveys, Korn Ferry Pay, Pave, Payscale
- GPT-5.4 mini: Aon's Radford McLagan Compensation Database; alternatives Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Payscale, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Pave, Radford; alternatives Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Payscale MarketPay, WTW
- Perplexity Sonar: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey; alternatives Pave, Ravio
- Grok 4.20: Radford; alternatives Korn Ferry Pay, Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Salary.com CompAnalyst, Willis Towers Watson
- Mistral Small: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey; alternatives Aon's Radford McLagan Compensation Database, Deloitte
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Radford; alternatives Carta Total Compensation, Korn Ferry Pay, Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Pave
- Llama 4 Maverick: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey; alternatives Ficstar, PayScale Insight, Radford, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Radford; alternatives Korn Ferry Pay, Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Willis Towers Watson
- Kimi K2: Radford; alternatives Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, WTW
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Mercer – Global Total Remuneration Survey; alternatives Pave, Radford, Ravio, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- MiniMax M2.5: Korn Ferry Pay, Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Willis Towers Watson; alternatives Payscale, Radford, Ravio

## Sources the answers cite

61 of 72 answers came back with a source list, from 12 of 12 models. Sites named in the most answers:

- ravio.com: 43 answers, 122 citations
- worldmetrics.org: 29 answers, 60 citations
- zipdo.co: 26 answers, 34 citations
- salarycube.com: 23 answers, 41 citations
- gitnux.org: 19 answers, 31 citations
- comprehensive.io: 18 answers, 20 citations
- captivateiq.com: 14 answers, 16 citations
- payscale.com: 14 answers, 15 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://ravio.com/blog/compensation-benchmarking-companies (32 answers)
- https://ravio.com/blog/the-best-tools-for-salary-benchmarking (22 answers)
- https://comprehensive.io/content/best-compensation-benchmarking-data-sources (17 answers)
- https://ravio.com/blog/salary-survey-providers (16 answers)
- https://worldmetrics.org/service/it-benchmarking (15 answers)
- https://captivateiq.com/blog/compensation-benchmarking-software (14 answers)
- https://ficstar.com/best-compensation-benchmarking-data-providers-2026 (14 answers)
- https://payscale.com/ (12 answers)
- https://worldmetrics.org/service/corporate-benchmarking (11 answers)
- https://bestrecruitingtools.com/blog/best-compensation-management-software-enterprise-2026 (10 answers)

## Warned against

- Mercer Total Remuneration Survey: 5 of 37 labels negative. "Why you should avoid traditional providers (Mercer, Radford, Willis Towers Watson)" (GLM 4.7 FlashX, budget prompt)
- Payscale: 5 of 21 labels negative. "Payscale (for high-complexity executive roles). Why to avoid: These platforms often suffer from "self-selection bias."" (Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt)
- Radford: 3 of 24 labels negative. "Providers to Avoid for "Predictable Total Cost" ... Custom pricing $15K–$80K+; participation requirements" (Kimi K2, budget prompt)
- Willis Towers Watson: 3 of 22 labels negative. "Why you should avoid traditional providers (Mercer, Radford, Willis Towers Watson)" (GLM 4.7 FlashX, budget prompt)

## Record

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