# SASE platforms: what AI models recommend, September 2026

Gane Index, September 2026 Edition. Asked as "SASE platform" and as "secure access service edge solution", six framings each, to twelve models with search on, on behalf of a mid-market B2B company. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/it/network/sase-platforms/2026-09

This is the permanent record of the September 2026 Edition, published September 17, 2026 and superseded since.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/it/network/sase-platforms/index.md

**Standing:** Cato SASE Cloud leads with 28% of first choices; verdict contested. 43 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| Rank | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | [Cato SASE Cloud](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/cato-sase-cloud/index.md) | 28% | 0% | 16 |
| 2 | [Cato Networks](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/cato-networks/index.md) | 26% | 8% | 25 |
| 3 | [Cloudflare One](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/cloudflare-one/index.md) | 23% | 11% | 44 |
| 4 | [Cisco Umbrella](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/cisco-umbrella/index.md) | 7% | 17% | 18 |
| 5 | [Check Point Harmony SASE](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/check-point-harmony-sase/index.md) | 5% | 13% | 15 |
| 7 | [Netskope One](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/netskope-one/index.md) | 2% | 10% | 30 |
| 10 | [Fortinet FortiSASE](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/fortinet-fortisase/index.md) | 0% | 15% | 41 |
| 11 | [Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/zscaler-zero-trust-exchange/index.md) | 0% | 28% | 46 |
| 12 | [Cisco Secure Access](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/cisco-secure-access/index.md) | 0% | 23% | 26 |
| 13 | [Palo Alto Networks Prisma SASE](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/palo-alto-networks-prisma-sase/index.md) | 0% | 36% | 33 |

Rank is by share of first choices among all 39 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: Cato SASE Cloud; alternatives Check Point Harmony SASE, OpenVPN CloudConnexa
- GPT-5.4 mini: Cato SASE Cloud; alternatives Cisco Secure Access, Fortinet FortiSASE, Palo Alto Networks Prisma SASE, Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Cato Networks; alternatives Cloudflare One, Fortinet FortiSASE, Netskope One
- Perplexity Sonar: Cato Networks; alternatives Check Point Harmony SASE, Fortinet FortiSASE, Palo Alto Networks Prisma SASE
- Grok 4.20: Cato SASE Cloud; alternatives Cloudflare One, Fortinet FortiSASE
- Mistral Small: Cato SASE Cloud; alternatives Cisco Umbrella, Fortinet FortiSASE
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Cato Networks; alternatives Cloudflare One, Fortinet FortiSASE
- Llama 4 Maverick: Cato SASE Cloud
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Cato Networks; alternatives Cisco Umbrella, Fortinet FortiSASE
- Kimi K2: Cato Networks; alternatives Cisco Umbrella, Netskope One
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Cato SASE Cloud; alternatives Cisco Umbrella, Cloudflare One, Fortinet FortiSASE, Netskope One
- MiniMax M2.5: Cato SASE Cloud; alternatives Cisco Umbrella, Fortinet FortiSASE, Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange

## Sources the answers cite

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

- gartner.com: 35 answers, 55 citations
- sase.cloud: 25 answers, 49 citations
- fortinet.com: 24 answers, 37 citations
- pickmysoft.com: 24 answers, 24 citations
- blog.openvpn.net: 23 answers, 23 citations
- sasecompare.com: 22 answers, 25 citations
- costbench.com: 20 answers, 25 citations
- jimber.io: 19 answers, 22 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://gartner.com/reviews/market/single-vendor-sase (29 answers)
- https://pickmysoft.com/blog/best-secure-access-service-edge-sase-platforms (24 answers)
- https://blog.openvpn.net/best-sase-solution (23 answers)
- https://sasecompare.com/blog/best-sase-providers-2026-comparison-criteria (21 answers)
- https://costbench.com/best/sase-for-mid-market (20 answers)
- https://techrepublic.com/article/secure-access-service-edge-platforms (19 answers)
- https://viewpointanalysis.com/post/sase-software-options-2026 (18 answers)
- https://macronetservices.com/sase-leaders-vendors-comparison (15 answers)
- https://guideflow.com/blog/sase-platform (14 answers)
- https://jimber.io/blog/sase-vendors-how-to-evaluate-and-compare-platforms-in-2026 (12 answers)

## Warned against

- Zscaler Zero Trust Exchange: 13 of 46 labels negative. "generally not recommended for mid-sized B2B companies" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, paraphrase prompt)
- Palo Alto Networks Prisma SASE: 12 of 33 labels negative. "you might want to avoid the enterprise-heavy giants like Cisco and Palo Alto" (Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt)
- Cisco Secure Access: 6 of 26 labels negative. "Avoid single-vendor solutions that are essentially two separate platforms (like Cisco Secure Access and Catalyst SD-WAN)" (GLM 4.7 FlashX, negative prompt)
- Fortinet FortiSASE: 6 of 41 labels negative. "has historically suffered from a steep learning curve and complex setup compared to born-in-the-cloud alternatives" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, negative prompt)

## Record

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