# OpenBao: how AI models rank it, November 2026

Gane Index, November 2026 Edition. Named in 17 judge labels across 3 categories by 10 of 14 models. Page: https://www.gane.ai/index/it/vendors/openbao

## Standing by category

| Category | Share | Rank | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| [Non-human identity management](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/identity/non-human-identity-management/index.md) | 2% | 15 | 0% | 3 |
| [Secrets management](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/identity/secrets-management/index.md) | 0% | 10 | 0% | 13 |
| [SaaS security posture management](https://www.gane.ai/index/it/security/saas-security-posture-management/index.md) | 0% | 43 | 0% | 1 |

## What the models said for it

- "Best on a tight budget: OpenBao—if your team can operate it. It's a free, self-hosted platform" (GPT-6 Luna, NHI management)
- "A Linux Foundation-governed fork of Vault under the traditional MPL 2.0 license... widely seen as the "safe" open-source path forward." (Qwen 3.7 Flash, Secrets)
- "OpenBao and SOPS, which are fully open-source and free but may require more development resources and complexity" (Llama 4 Maverick, Secrets)
- "Teams looking for open-source alternatives often evaluate OpenBao (the Linux Foundation fork of Vault)" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, NHI management)

## By model

| Model | First choice | Alternative | Mention | Warning | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Haiku 4.5 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| GPT-5.4 mini | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | 0 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 4 |
| Perplexity Sonar | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Grok 4.20 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Mistral Small | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Llama 4 Maverick | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Qwen 3.7 Flash | 0 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 3 |
| Kimi K2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| GLM 4.7 FlashX | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| MiniMax M2.5 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| GPT-6 Luna | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Muse Glimmer 30B | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |

## Sources returned with these answers

The sites and pages cited by the answers that named OpenBao, from 46 of the 48 answers that named it (only the models that return a source list).

### Domains cited

- infisical.com: 27
- akeyless.io: 25
- securityboulevard.com: 21
- startwithidentity.com: 18
- github.com: 13
- safeguard.sh: 13
- spotsaas.com: 13
- pulumi.com: 10
- cheatsheetseries.owasp.org: 9
- ibm.com: 9

### Pages cited

- https://securityboulevard.com/2026/05/top-16-secrets-management-tools-and-platforms-for-2026-compared: 15
- https://spotsaas.com/blog/best-secrets-management-tools: 13
- https://akeyless.io/blog/best-secret-management-tools: 11
- https://safeguard.sh/resources/blog/best-secrets-management-tools-2026: 11
- https://pulumi.com/blog/secrets-management-tools-guide: 10
- https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Secrets_Management_Cheat_Sheet.html: 9
- https://digital.va.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Secrets-Management-ETG_12_2024.docx: 8
- https://startwithidentity.com/articles/top-8-secrets-management-tools.md: 8

## In its own words

What OpenBao's own pages state, read 2026-09-28. Stated by the vendor, not checked by the index.

- Positioning: an open source, community-driven secrets manager and fork of Vault managed by the Linux Foundation's OpenSSF (https://openbao.org/)
- For: organizations (https://openbao.org/)

## What it publishes

Every page openbao.org exposes, read 2026-09-29: 1843 addresses. By kind, pages and the last 90 days:

- blog: 36 pages, 9 in the last 90 days, latest 2026-08-18
- report or ebook: 29 pages, 0 in the last 90 days, latest undated
- template or tool: 4 pages, 0 in the last 90 days, latest undated
- glossary or explainer: 8 pages, 0 in the last 90 days, latest undated
- Recent: 2026-08-18 blog: Release v2 6 0 https://openbao.org/blog/release-v2-6-0
- Recent: 2026-08-12 blog: Flux openbao secrets signatures https://openbao.org/blog/flux-openbao-secrets-signatures
- Recent: 2026-08-06 blog: Features recursive list https://openbao.org/blog/features-recursive-list
- Recent: 2026-07-30 blog: Features declarative plugins https://openbao.org/blog/features-declarative-plugins
- Recent: 2026-07-27 blog: Karras os siemens 2026 talk https://openbao.org/blog/karras-os-siemens-2026-talk
- Recent: 2026-07-21 blog: Features declarative configuration https://openbao.org/blog/features-declarative-configuration

## 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.