September 2026 Edition, published · The permanent record of that edition, superseded since. The current standing is on the category page →
Index › IT › Security operations › PTaaS › Enterprise · September 2026 Edition

Penetration testing as a service for enterprise buyers

Asked as “penetration testing service”, and as “pentest-as-a-service provider”, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. 48 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing · first-choice share
40%
Contested · Synack 23%
40NetSPI23Synack15Cobalt23others

40% of first choices, contested.

By buyer segment

The same question asked on behalf of a different buyer. Each standing is computed within its segment; they sit side by side and are never added together.

The standing

Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all twelve models, for an enterprise B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01NetSPI40%0%36endorsed leader
02Synack23%0%42accepted challenger
03Cobalt15%6%35accepted challenger
04Bishop Fox4%7%27accepted challenger
05BreachLock4%0%13accepted challenger
06HackerOne PTaaS4%14%21accepted challenger
07NCC Group2%6%17accepted challenger
Show the two products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
09Bugcrowd PTaaS0%25%12criticized challenger
08Mandiant Lab in the set0%0%13accepted challenger
Bars are the share of first choices, 0 to 100Every product with at least 10 labels here. Every product name links to its product page.

Mandiant is made by Google, whose model Gemini 3.5 Flash is in the set. On the four share prompts that model made it the first choice zero times of 4; the other eleven models zero times of 44. Lab treatment is defined on the method page; the row is marked, not excluded.

Head to headHead-to-head pages are published for mid-market buyers, so these open on mid-market figures, not enterprise.
All six head-to-head pages: the top four products, each against each

Recommended versus criticized

Every product with at least 10 labels here, on both axes. The 30% line names a quadrant, not the verdict above: that one needs more than 40%.

Criticized challengerCriticized default
Negative label rate →
01
02
03
04
05
H06
07
08
B09
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative50%
Key
01NetSPI40%
02Synack23%
03Cobalt15%
04Bishop Fox4%
05BreachLock4%
06HackerOne PTaaS4%
07NCC Group2%
08Mandiant0%
09Bugcrowd PTaaS0%

What they warned about

Two of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.4 mini, Gemini 3.5 Flash, Grok 4.20, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, Kimi K2 and MiniMax M2.5 changed. A high negative share on a product with few labels is a warning. A low share on a product with many labels is salience, not sentiment.
Bugcrowd PTaaS
25%
3 of 12 labels negative · 2 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“Avoid pure crowdsourced (HackerOne/Bugcrowd) due to variable bounties/credits” Grok 4.20, budget prompt
Bishop Fox
7%
2 of 27 labels negative · 2 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“What to Avoid for Predictable Cost ... Costs scale unpredictably as scope expands.” DeepSeek V4 Flash, budget prompt
HackerOne PTaaS
14%
3 of 21 labels negative · 1 of 12 models · 2 hard negative
“Avoid pure crowdsourced (HackerOne/Bugcrowd) due to variable bounties/credits” Grok 4.20, budget prompt
AttackIQ Flex
100%
1 of 1 labels negative · 1 of 12 models · 1 hard negative
“avoid pure pay-as-you-go services like AttackIQ Flex unless your testing volume is tightly controlled” GPT-5.4 mini, budget prompt

What they cite

Twelve of the twelve models returned a source list in this edition: four return the pages they cited and eight the search results they consulted.

Sites the answers cite

64 of 72 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 12 of 12 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 980 links across 233 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

vendor site · Synack46 answers · 67 citations · 12 models
vendor site · DeepStrike45 answers · 84 citations · 11 models
vendor site · Stingrai32 answers · 50 citations · 9 models
vendor site · Cybri25 answers · 31 citations · 11 models
vendor site · UnderDefense25 answers · 27 citations · 8 models
vendor site · Software Secured23 answers · 29 citations · 8 models
vendor site · Bright Defense16 answers · 19 citations · 8 models
16 answers · 18 citations · 7 models
vendor site · Redbot Security14 answers · 14 citations · 7 models
14 answers · 14 citations · 7 models
13 answers · 15 citations · 6 models
13 answers · 14 citations · 8 models

Pages the answers cite

The ten pages named in the most answers, by full address. A page here is one the models returned with a recommendation, not one the index endorses.

Search against answers

Each company's standing in the answers beside its site's footprint in Google search, one row a site: the products the models named on it with their shares, and the share they add up to; monthly searches on Google, and DataForSEO's estimate of AI search demand (modeled from search signals, directional, not a count of queries to any assistant), for the most-searched of the company's and its products' names (the name is in each row's hover text); estimated monthly organic visits to the site; and its best position in Google's top ten for “best penetration testing service”, “penetration testing service”, “penetration testing services”. US estimates from DataForSEO and Google's Ads Transparency Center. A small company's site, or a mid-sized company's site for its flagship, is marked company; a product on a large parent's site (Google, Microsoft) has no site figures. A column with no figures for this category is left out, and an empty cell means none were seen, not none exist. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.
Company and productsShareOwn site citedName searches, GoogleAI search demand, est.Organic visitsPaid search a month, est.Google ads, last 30 daysBest Google position
NetSPI netspi.com40%671,900584,142$33643
Synack synack.com23%662,400596,76474
Cobalt cobalt.io15%127135,00027,73223,65514
Bishop Fox bishopfox.com4%441,6001823,9621
BreachLock breachlock.com4%8159062,47922
HackerOne PTaaS hackerone.com4%342,038,0877
Pentera pentera.io4%1231,900499,5800
NCC Group nccgroup.com2%321,300793,18210
Deloitte deloitte.com2%8301,00014,412881,066$2,177117
Terra Security terra.security2%3,1701

Google's top ten for the three searches hold 22 sites; 4 of them are among the sites the models cited here (cybri.com, getastra.com, redbotsecurity.com, synack.com). The first result for “best penetration testing service” is reddit.com.

How they answered

Six framings of the same buying question, each sent to every model in a fresh session with search on. One row per model, so a row shows whether it held its answer under rewording, what it named when cost was the constraint, and what it argued against. Computed from the raw judge labels.
ShowHide
ModelDirect“What is the best penetration testing service for an enterprise B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which pentest-as-a-service provider would you recommend to a large B2B company with thousands of employees?”Comparative“What are the top enterprise-grade penetration testing services and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best penetration testing service for a large company that needs predictable total cost across thousands of users?”Scale-constrained“We are a 5,000 person company with SSO, SOC 2 and procurement review requirements evaluating a penetration testing service. What should we look at?”Negative“Which penetration testing services should a large enterprise avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5NetSPI
Three alternativesBreachLock, NCC Group, Synack
NetSPI, SynackChanged
One alternativeIBM X-Force Red
no first choice
Five alternativesCoalfire, Cobalt, IBM X-Force Red, NetSPI, Synack
Synack
Three alternativesCobalt, Invicti, Pentera
no first choicenothing named
GPT-5.4 miniNetSPI
Four alternativesBreachLock, Horizon3.ai NodeZero, Pentera, UnderDefense
CobaltChanged
Two alternativesBugcrowd PTaaS, Synack
no first choice
One alternativeCobalt
HackerOne PTaaS
One alternativeCobalt
against: AttackIQ Flex
no first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashNetSPI
Four alternativesBishop Fox, BreachLock, Cobalt, Synack
NetSPI, SynackChanged
Four alternativesBishop Fox Cosmos, Bugcrowd PTaaS, Cobalt, HackerOne PTaaS
no first choice
Eight alternativesBishop Fox, BreachLock, Cobalt, Mandiant, NCC Group, NetSPI, Pentera, Synack
BreachLock, Cobalt
Three alternativesHorizon3.ai NodeZero, KnowBe4, Pentera
no first choicenothing named
Perplexity SonarNetSPI
Seven alternativesAppSecure Security, Bishop Fox, Cobalt, Mandiant, NCC Group, Redbot Security, Synack
NetSPIHeld
Two alternativesBishop Fox, Synack
NetSPI
Six alternativesBishop Fox, Coalfire, Cobalt, Mandiant, Rapid7, Synack
NetSPI
Two alternativesCobalt, Synack
no first choicenothing named
Grok 4.20Bishop Fox, NetSPI
Three alternativesMandiant, NCC Group, Synack
against: HackerOne PTaaS, Intruder, Pentest-Tools.com
NetSPI, SynackChanged
One alternativeBishop Fox
against: Bugcrowd PTaaS, Cobalt, HackerOne PTaaS
Cobalt, Synack
Three alternativesBishop Fox, Coalfire, NetSPI
NetSPI
Four alternativesBishop Fox, Cybri, Invicti, Synack
against: Bugcrowd PTaaS, Cobalt, HackerOne PTaaS
no first choicenothing named
Mistral SmallDeloitte, Terra Security
One alternativeAstra Security
NetSPIChanged
Four alternativesBreachLock, Cobalt, HackerOne PTaaS, Synack
Bishop Fox
Six alternativesCobalt, Deloitte, Invicti, NCC Group, NetSPI, Praetorian
Synack
Three alternativesCobalt, Cybri, NetSPI
no first choicenothing named
DeepSeek V4 FlashBishop Fox, NetSPI
Two alternativesCoalfire, Synack
NetSPI, SynackChanged
Two alternativesCobalt, HackerOne PTaaS
NetSPI
Eight alternativesBishop Fox, Bugcrowd PTaaS, Cobalt, HackerOne PTaaS, IBM X-Force Red, Mandiant, NCC Group, Synack
HackerOne PTaaS
Three alternativesPentera, Picus Security, Synack
against: Bishop Fox, Bugcrowd PTaaS, IBM X-Force Red, NCC Group, Risk72
no first choicenothing named
Llama 4 Maverickno first choiceBreachLockChanged
Three alternativesDeepStrike, NetSPI, Software Secured
no first choiceno first choiceno first choicenothing named
Qwen 3.7 FlashCobalt, Synack
Four alternativesBishop Fox, Secops, Trustwave, VerSprite
CobaltChanged
Three alternativesAntisyphon, Bugcrowd PTaaS, ImmuniWeb
Cobalt
Six alternativesBishop Fox, BreachLock, HackerOne PTaaS, IBM X-Force Red, Offensive Security Services, Synack
Pentera
Three alternativesCobalt, HackerOne PTaaS, SafeBreach
no first choicenothing named
Kimi K2Cobalt, Synack
Four alternativesBishop Fox, HackerOne PTaaS, NCC Group, NetSPI
NetSPI, SynackChanged
One alternativeBishop Fox
NetSPI
Seven alternativesBishop Fox, Cobalt, CrowdStrike, HackerOne PTaaS, Mandiant, Rapid7, Synack
Cobalt
Two alternativesNetSPI, Synack
no first choicenothing named
GLM 4.7 FlashXNetSPI
Four alternativesAstra Security, Bishop Fox, Cobalt, Synack
NetSPIHeld
Two alternativesCobalt, HackerOne PTaaS
NetSPI, Synack
Five alternativesBishop Fox, Cobalt, IBM X-Force Red, Mandiant, Secureworks
Cobalt, NetSPI, Pentera, Synack
One alternativeSimbian
against: Bishop Fox
no first choicenothing named
MiniMax M2.5NCC Group
Eight alternativesBugcrowd PTaaS, Deloitte, EY, IBM X-Force, IOActive, PwC, Rapid7, Synack
NetSPIChanged
Three alternativesDeepStrike, Stingrai, Synack
no first choiceSynack
Three alternativesCymptom, GuidePoint, Pentestas
no first choicenothing named
Bold is the first choiceAlternatives are counted; the count opens them.What the answer argued against

The record

One row per call: the version string exactly as returned, whether the model searched, sources cited, and latency.
Seventy-two rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
PromptModelVersion stringTime (UTC)SearchedSourcesLatency
Direct recommendationClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 12:51yes1310 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 09:35yes47 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 10:53yes1825 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 14:02yes205 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 10:39yes2117 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 13:31yes54 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 11:16yes1015 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 11:08yes53 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 10:40no041 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 10:16yes1427 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 13:13yes1571 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 13:38no060 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 11:25yes1611 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 09:23yes35 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 10:23yes1326 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 13:36yes207 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 13:20yes3626 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 10:49yes56 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 13:20yes1011 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 13:13yes52 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 09:59no034 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 12:17yes816 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 12:41yes3156 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 10:14yes1358 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 09:26yes1411 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 10:02yes58 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 13:18yes2124 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 11:02yes2010 s
ComparativeGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 09:50yes3417 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 13:00yes810 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 09:28yes2327 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 12:23yes53 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 13:22yes545 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 10:15yes2943 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 13:10yes3348 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 10:15yes1532 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 13:11yes1911 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 13:08yes35 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 12:41yes2328 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 10:29yes206 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 09:29yes3820 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 11:30yes520 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 10:35yes2641 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 13:21yes53 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 10:36no042 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 10:11yes1840 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 10:59yes22119 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 13:07yes1579 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 10:38yes1815 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 13:13no06 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 13:44yes1128 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 09:23yes198 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 12:05yes2012 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 10:36no09 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 13:50yes3041 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 12:18yes54 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 10:12no042 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 13:09yes2445 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 14:10yes1540 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 09:28yes1038 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-09-17 10:14yes1812 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-09-17 10:04no05 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-09-17 09:23yes1626 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-09-17 12:48yes207 s
Negative framingGrok 4.20spacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex (asked for grok-4.20-non-reasoning; the API answered as this version)2026-09-17 10:52yes1810 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-09-17 09:26yes56 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via fireworks2026-09-17 12:19yes1820 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-09-17 11:01yes53 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-09-17 11:22yes532 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-09-17 11:20yes1334 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-09-17 13:31yes14110 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-09-17 11:03yes583 s

Normalization in this category

Every judgment call made between the raw labels and the numbers above, listed so it is visible and reversible.

ShowHide
Category-scoped readings
Astra read as Astra Security
Bugcrowd read as Bugcrowd PTaaS
HackerOne read as HackerOne PTaaS
HackerOne (Business Program) read as HackerOne PTaaS
HackerOne Business Protect read as HackerOne PTaaS
HackerOne Enterprise / Enterprise Plus read as HackerOne PTaaS
HackerOne Pentest read as HackerOne PTaaS
Horizon3.ai read as Horizon3.ai NodeZero
Horizon3.ai (NodeZero) read as Horizon3.ai NodeZero
Unresolved, counted raw
Axipro
Canima
Cobalt Strike
Coral Esecure
CyberGlobal
Cymptom
GuidePoint
Offensive Security Services
Q-Sec
Rackpoint
Risk72
SecFusion
Secops (RedTeam.com)
Verizon Enterprise Solutions (RISK Team)
Vynox
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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