# Customer identity and access management for small business buyers: what AI models recommend, October 2026

Gane Index, October 2026 Edition. Asked as "customer identity platform" and as "CIAM solution for a product's users", six framings each, to fourteen models with search on, on behalf of a small B2B company. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/it/identity/customer-identity-and-access-management/2026-10/smb

This is the permanent record of the October 2026 Edition, published October 1, 2026 and superseded since.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/it/identity/customer-identity-and-access-management/smb/index.md

**Standing:** Clerk leads with 30% of first choices; verdict contested. 63 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| Rank | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | [Clerk](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/clerk/index.md) | 30% | 4% | 57 |
| 2 | [Frontegg](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/frontegg/index.md) | 19% | 0% | 33 |
| 3 | [Auth0](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/auth0/index.md) | 13% | 49% | 74 |
| 4 | [WorkOS AuthKit](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/workos-authkit/index.md) | 10% | 3% | 34 |
| 5 | [Descope](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/descope/index.md) | 6% | 0% | 24 |
| 6 | [FusionAuth](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/fusionauth/index.md) | 5% | 4% | 23 |
| 7 | [Supabase Auth](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/supabase-auth/index.md) | 5% | 0% | 20 |
| 8 | [Amazon Cognito](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/amazon-cognito/index.md) | 5% | 34% | 41 |
| 13 | [Stytch](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/stytch/index.md) | 0% | 3% | 32 |
| 14 | [Firebase Authentication](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/firebase-authentication/index.md) | 0% | 16% | 31 |
| 15 | [Keycloak](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/keycloak/index.md) | 0% | 19% | 16 |
| 16 | [LoginRadius](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/loginradius/index.md) | 0% | 19% | 16 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 49 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: Clerk; alternatives Descope, PropelAuth, WorkOS AuthKit
- GPT-5.4 mini: WorkOS AuthKit; alternatives Clerk, Descope, Stytch
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Frontegg; alternatives Clerk, Kinde, PropelAuth, WorkOS AuthKit
- Perplexity Sonar: Clerk, WorkOS AuthKit; alternatives Frontegg, Stytch
- Grok 4.20: Clerk, WorkOS AuthKit; alternatives Auth0, Descope, FusionAuth, Stytch
- Mistral Small: Clerk, Frontegg; alternatives Strivacity
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: FusionAuth; alternatives Descope, Frontegg, WorkOS AuthKit
- Llama 4 Maverick: no first choice
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Clerk, Frontegg; alternatives WorkOS AuthKit
- Kimi K2: Clerk, WorkOS AuthKit; alternatives Auth0, Stytch
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: WorkOS AuthKit; alternatives Auth0, Clerk, Frontegg, SSOJet
- MiniMax M2.5: Clerk; alternatives Auth0, Frontegg, WorkOS AuthKit
- GPT-6 Luna: Clerk; alternatives Auth0, Stytch, WorkOS AuthKit
- Muse Glimmer 30B: Frontegg; alternatives Amazon Cognito, Clerk, Descope, FusionAuth

## Sources the answers cite

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

- loginradius.com: 29 answers, 35 citations
- g2.com: 28 answers, 51 citations
- startwithidentity.com: 28 answers, 45 citations
- spotsaas.com: 28 answers, 35 citations
- cybersecuritynews.com: 27 answers, 34 citations
- clerk.com: 26 answers, 53 citations
- expertinsights.com: 26 answers, 26 citations
- mojoauth.com: 23 answers, 34 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://expertinsights.com/identity-and-access-management/top-customer-identity-and-access-management-ciam-solutions (26 answers)
- https://spotsaas.com/blog/customer-identity-and-access-management-software (26 answers)
- https://g2.com/categories/customer-identity-and-access-management-ciam/small-business (24 answers)
- https://loginradius.com/blog/identity/top-ciam-for-small-and-medium-businesses (23 answers)
- https://checkthat.ai/answers/what-are-the-best-customer-identity-and-access-management-solutions (20 answers)
- https://guideflow.com/blog/ciam-software (20 answers)
- https://viasocket.com/discovery/blog/hrxptg/customer-identity-and-access-management-ciam/top-10-ciam-tools-for-frictionless-onboarding (20 answers)
- https://cybersecuritynews.com/best-ciam-solutions/amp (16 answers)
- https://descope.com/blog/post/ciam-solutions (16 answers)
- https://thectoclub.com/tools/best-ciam-solutions (15 answers)

## Warned against

- Auth0: 36 of 74 labels negative. "Enterprise Tier CIAM Suites (Okta Customer Identity Cloud, Ping Identity + ForgeRock, IBM Verify)... Platforms to Avoid or Approach with Extreme Caution" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt)
- ForgeRock Identity Platform: 10 of 10 labels negative. "ForgeRock can be a significant investment, potentially making it less accessible for smaller businesses or startups with limited budgets." (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)
- Amazon Cognito: 14 of 41 labels negative. "If your application isn't deeply embedded in AWS (Lambda, API Gateway, S3, etc.), don't use it." (DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt)
- Okta: 10 of 12 labels negative. "small businesses should be cautious about or avoid the following types... Enterprise-focused CIAM platforms such as Okta (for customer use cases)" (Llama 4 Maverick, negative prompt)

## Movement since September 2026

Floor: 11 points of share, measured on the calibration repeat.
Same leader: Clerk at 32%.

- Auth0: 25% to 14%, −11. Inside the floor by 0 points · rank 2 → 3 of 45.
- Clerk: 27% to 32%, +5. Inside the floor by 6 points · rank 1 of 45, unchanged.
- Descope: 2% to 7%, +5. Inside the floor by 6 points · rank 8 → 5 of 45.
- FusionAuth: 0% to 5%, +5. Inside the floor by 6 points · rank 13 → 6 of 45.
- LoginRadius: 4% to 0%, −4. Inside the floor by 7 points · rank 6 → 14 of 45.
- Frontegg: 15% to 18%, +3. Inside the floor by 8 points · rank 3 → 2 of 45.
- Supabase Auth: 0% to 2%, +2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 14 → 9 of 45.
- Microsoft Entra External ID: 0% to 2%, +2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 31 → 10 of 45.
- Firebase Authentication: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 9 → 12 of 45.
- WorkOS AuthKit: 10% to 11%, +1. Inside the floor by 10 points · rank 4 of 45, unchanged.
- Amazon Cognito: 4% to 5%, +1. Inside the floor by 10 points · rank 7 of 45, unchanged.
- Stytch: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 12 → 11 of 45.

## Record

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