# ETL and ELT: what AI models recommend, November 2026

Gane Index, November 2026 Edition. Asked as "ETL tool" and as "data pipeline and ELT platform", six framings each, to fourteen models with search on, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/it/it-data/etl-and-elt/2026-11

**Standing:** Airbyte leads with 40% 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 | [Airbyte](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/airbyte/index.md) | 40% | 4% | 75 |
| 2 | [Fivetran](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/fivetran/index.md) | 31% | 18% | 66 |
| 3 | [Integrate.io](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/integrate-io/index.md) | 13% | 5% | 19 |
| 5 | [dbt](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/dbt/index.md) | 4% | 5% | 42 |
| 6 | [Hevo Data](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/hevo-data/index.md) | 4% | 16% | 31 |
| 7 | [Apache Airflow](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/apache-airflow/index.md) | 2% | 10% | 21 |
| 9 | [Matillion](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/matillion/index.md) | 0% | 6% | 35 |
| 10 | [Meltano](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/meltano/index.md) | 0% | 0% | 13 |
| 11 | [Apache NiFi](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/apache-nifi/index.md) | 0% | 0% | 13 |
| 12 | [Azure Data Factory](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/azure-data-factory/index.md) | 0% | 14% | 21 |
| 13 | [AWS Glue](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/aws-glue/index.md) | 0% | 22% | 23 |
| 14 | [Stitch](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/stitch/index.md) | 0% | 22% | 23 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 93 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: no first choice
- GPT-5.4 mini: Fivetran; alternatives Airbyte, Matillion
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Fivetran; alternatives Airbyte, Matillion, Rivery, dbt
- Perplexity Sonar: Hevo Data; alternatives Airbyte, Fivetran, Integrate.io, Matillion
- Grok 4.20: Integrate.io; alternatives Airbyte, Fivetran, Matillion, dbt
- Mistral Small: Fivetran; alternatives Integrate.io, Kleene.ai, Matillion
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Fivetran; alternatives Airbyte, Hevo Data, Integrate.io
- Llama 4 Maverick: Fivetran, Integrate.io, Kleene.ai
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Fivetran; alternatives Airbyte, Matillion
- Kimi K2: Integrate.io; alternatives Airbyte, Apache Airflow, Fivetran, Kleene.ai
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Integrate.io; alternatives Airbyte, Fivetran, Hevo Data, Matillion
- MiniMax M2.5: Integrate.io; alternatives Airbyte, Apache Airflow, Fivetran, dbt
- GPT-6 Luna: Fivetran; alternatives Airbyte, dbt
- Muse Glimmer 30B: Integrate.io, Kleene.ai; alternatives Airbyte, Fivetran, Hevo Data

## Sources the answers cite

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

- airbyte.com: 40 answers, 75 citations
- integrate.io: 34 answers, 66 citations
- hevodata.com: 22 answers, 38 citations
- fivetran.com: 20 answers, 25 citations
- weld.app: 20 answers, 20 citations
- datachannel.co: 16 answers, 19 citations
- skyvia.com: 15 answers, 17 citations
- zoho.com: 13 answers, 15 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://airbyte.com/top-etl-tools-for-sources/etl-tools (20 answers)
- https://weld.app/blog/etl-tools-compared (18 answers)
- https://dataquest.io/blog/etl-tools-practical-guide-with-examples (13 answers)
- https://zapier.com/blog/etl-tools (13 answers)
- https://tapdata.io/blog/best-etl-tools-2024-seamless-integration-guide (12 answers)
- https://techrepublic.com/article/etl-tools (12 answers)
- https://informationweek.com/data-management/the-top-etl-tools-for-2024 (11 answers)
- https://zoho.com/dataprep/the-best-etl-tools-2026.html (11 answers)
- https://airbyte.com/data-engineering-resources/best-tools-replace-legacy-etl-systems-enterprises (9 answers)
- https://fivetran.com/learn/etl-tools (9 answers)

## Warned against

- Talend: 15 of 38 labels negative. "Do not start new projects on Talend Open Studio—Qlik officially retired and discontinued the free open-source edition." (Gemini 3.5 Flash, budget prompt)
- Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud: 13 of 28 labels negative. "Legacy ETL Platforms to Approach Carefully ... Consumption-based IPU billing can exceed initial projections significantly" (MiniMax M2.5, negative prompt)
- Fivetran: 12 of 66 labels negative. "Avoid per-row pricing models - tools like Fivetran can have costs multiply by 5x in a single quarter" (MiniMax M2.5, budget prompt)
- Informatica PowerCenter: 8 of 10 labels negative. "The biggest risks are (1) legacy tools like Informatica PowerCenter that trap you with high costs and rigidity" (DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt)

## Movement since October 2026

Floor: 11 points of share, measured on the calibration repeat.
New leader: Fivetran (40%) to Airbyte (40%). Margin 9 points, within noise.

- Airbyte: 28% to 40%, +12. Cleared the floor by 1 point · rank 2 → 1 of 93.
- Integrate.io: 2% to 13%, +11. Inside the floor by 0 points · rank 9 → 3 of 93.
- Hevo Data: 15% to 4%, −11. Cleared the floor by 0 points · rank 3 → 6 of 93.
- Fivetran: 40% to 31%, −9. Inside the floor by 2 points · rank 1 → 2 of 93.
- Stitch: 4% to 0%, −4. Inside the floor by 7 points · rank 4 → 14 of 93.
- Talend: 4% to 0%, −4. Inside the floor by 7 points · rank 5 → 75 of 93.
- dbt: 2% to 4%, +2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 6 → 5 of 93.
- Apache Airflow: 0% to 2%, +2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 15 → 7 of 93.
- Meltano: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 7 → 10 of 93.
- Apache NiFi: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 8 → 11 of 93.
- Skyvia: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 10 → 15 of 93.
- Matillion: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 11 → 9 of 93.

## Record

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