# Network access control for small business buyers: what AI models recommend, November 2026

Gane Index, November 2026 Edition. Asked as "network access control solution" and as "NAC system", six framings each, to fourteen models with search on, on behalf of a small B2B company. Added to the November 2026 Edition. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/it/network/network-access-control/smb

**Standing:** Portnox Cloud leads with 41% of first choices; verdict clear leader. 58 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| Rank | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | [Portnox Cloud](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/portnox-cloud/index.md) | 41% | 2% | 53 |
| 2 | [PacketFence](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/packetfence/index.md) | 16% | 13% | 39 |
| 3 | [NordLayer NAC](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/nordlayer-nac/index.md) | 3% | 7% | 29 |
| 4 | [Foxpass](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/foxpass/index.md) | 3% | 0% | 25 |
| 5 | [Cisco Meraki](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/cisco-meraki/index.md) | 3% | 9% | 22 |
| 21 | [Aruba ClearPass](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/aruba-clearpass/index.md) | 2% | 69% | 42 |
| 22 | [Twingate](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/twingate/index.md) | 0% | 5% | 22 |
| 38 | [FortiNAC](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/fortinac/index.md) | 0% | 33% | 12 |
| 90 | [Fortinet FortiNAC](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/fortinet-fortinac/index.md) | 0% | 56% | 18 |
| 91 | [Forescout](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/forescout/index.md) | 0% | 88% | 17 |
| 92 | [Cisco Identity Services Engine](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/cisco-identity-services-engine/index.md) | 0% | 78% | 40 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 92 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: Cloudflare One, Okta; alternatives Cisco Meraki, Fortinet FortiGate, Microsoft Entra ID
- GPT-5.4 mini: Portnox Cloud; alternatives Fortinet FortiNAC, HPE Aruba ClearPass
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Portnox Cloud; alternatives Cisco Meraki, Cloudflare One, Fortinet, Foxpass
- Perplexity Sonar: Portnox Cloud; alternatives Aruba ClearPass, Twingate
- Grok 4.20: NordLayer NAC; alternatives Azure AD Conditional Access, Foxpass, Microsoft Intune, UTunnel
- Mistral Small: Portnox Cloud; alternatives Foxpass, NordLayer NAC
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Portnox Cloud; alternatives NordLayer NAC, PacketFence
- Llama 4 Maverick: Portnox Cloud; alternatives Aruba ClearPass, PacketFence, macmon NAC
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Microsoft Entra ID; alternatives Cisco Meraki, Fortinet FortiGate, Ubiquiti UniFi
- Kimi K2: Portnox Cloud; alternatives NordLayer NAC, PacketFence, macmon NAC
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Portnox Cloud; alternatives Foxpass, NordLayer NAC
- MiniMax M2.5: Portnox Cloud; alternatives Coro, NordLayer NAC, Twingate
- GPT-6 Luna: Portnox Cloud; alternatives Aruba Central NAC, ClearPass
- Muse Glimmer 30B: Foxpass, Portnox Cloud NAC; alternatives Aruba ClearPass, PacketFence

## Sources the answers cite

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

- softwareadvice.com: 44 answers, 54 citations
- g2.com: 34 answers, 45 citations
- portnox.com: 31 answers, 70 citations
- cyberpress.org: 31 answers, 31 citations
- gane.ai/index: 29 answers, 29 citations
- capterra.com: 27 answers, 32 citations
- peerspot.com: 22 answers, 36 citations
- slashdot.org: 16 answers, 16 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://cyberpress.org/nac-solutions-by-business-size (31 answers)
- https://g2.com/categories/network-access-control-nac/small-business (31 answers)
- https://softwareadvice.com/network-access-control (31 answers)
- https://gane.ai/index/it/network/network-access-control/smb (28 answers)
- https://softwareadvice.com/network-access-control/small-business (22 answers)
- https://capterra.com/network-access-control-software (19 answers)
- https://portnox.com/pricing (17 answers)
- https://guideflow.com/blog/network-access-control-software (13 answers)
- https://peerspot.com/categories/network-access-control-nac (12 answers)
- https://slashdot.org/software/network-access-control-nac/f-small-business (12 answers)

## Warned against

- Cisco Identity Services Engine: 31 of 40 labels negative. "Solutions You Should Generally Avoid ... Cisco ISE (Identity Services Engine): Incredibly powerful, but notoriously complex, expensive, and difficult to manage." (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)
- Aruba ClearPass: 29 of 42 labels negative. "Any traditional appliance-based NAC solution (including Aruba ClearPass and Fortinet FortiNAC hardware variants) carries these risks for small businesses" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)
- Forescout: 15 of 17 labels negative. "receives a high negative sentiment score in expert reviews, with multiple models and user feedback pointing to significant drawbacks" (Mistral Small, negative prompt)
- Fortinet FortiNAC: 10 of 18 labels negative. "FortiNAC hardware variants are mentioned as carrying risks for small businesses, including poor design, numerous bugs" (Mistral Small, negative prompt)

## Movement since October 2026

Floor: 11 points of share, measured on the calibration repeat.
Same leader: Portnox Cloud at 41%.

- Portnox Cloud: 45% to 41%, −4. Inside the floor by 7 points · rank 1 of 92, unchanged.
- Foxpass: 0% to 3%, +3. Inside the floor by 8 points · rank 21 → 4 of 92.
- Aruba ClearPass: 5% to 2%, −3. Inside the floor by 8 points · rank 4 → 21 of 92.
- OPSWAT MetaAccess: 4% to 2%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 5 → 10 of 92.
- Fortinet FortiNAC: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 10 → 90 of 92.
- NordLayer NAC: 2% to 3%, +1. Inside the floor by 10 points · rank 9 → 3 of 92.
- Cisco Meraki: 2% to 3%, +1. Inside the floor by 10 points · rank 8 → 5 of 92.
- Ubiquiti UniFi: 4% to 3%, −1. Inside the floor by 10 points · rank 7 → 6 of 92.
- PacketFence: 16% to 16%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 2 of 92, unchanged.
- Twingate: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 19 → 22 of 92.
- FortiNAC: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 23 → 38 of 92.
- Forescout: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 86 → 91 of 92.

## 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.