AI Indexes
Finance AI Index
September 2026 Edition, published September 17, 2026 · The permanent record of that edition, superseded since. The current standing is on the category page →
Index › Accounting and close › Financial close manageme › Small business › September 2026 Edition

Financial close management for small business buyers

Asked as “financial close management software”, and as “month-end close software”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 64 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, twelve models each.
Standing · first-choice share
25%
Contested · FloQast 19%
25Numeric19FloQast06Double50others

25% 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 a small B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrant
01Numeric25%2%41accepted challenger
02FloQast19%35%51criticized challenger
03Double6%0%15accepted challenger
04QuickBooks Online6%8%12accepted challenger
05Datarails5%5%19accepted challenger
06Xero5%14%14accepted challenger
07Prophix3%21%14accepted challenger
Show the four products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
09Workiva0%94%16criticized challenger
10OneStream0%89%18criticized challenger
11BlackLine0%87%46criticized challenger
08Trintech0%86%14criticized 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.
All ten head-to-head pages: the top five 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
06
07
08
09
10
11
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative40%
Key
01Numeric25%
02FloQast19%
03Double6%
04QuickBooks Online6%
05Datarails5%
06Xero5%
07Prophix3%
08Trintech0%
09Workiva0%
10OneStream0%
11BlackLine0%

What they warned about

Zero of twelve models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.4 mini, Gemini 3.5 Flash, Perplexity Sonar, Grok 4.1 Fast, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, Kimi K2, GLM 4.7 FlashX 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.
BlackLine
87%
40 of 46 labels negative · 13 of 12 models · 23 hard negative
“small businesses should avoid: - **BlackLine**: The market leader for enterprise close... The complexity-to-value ratio does not pencil out for a 2 to 10 person team.” Claude Haiku 4.5, negative prompt
OneStream
89%
16 of 18 labels negative · 10 of 12 models · 15 hard negative
“massive platforms intended for consolidating data across hundreds of subsidiaries... difficult to manage” Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt
Workiva
94%
15 of 16 labels negative · 10 of 12 models · 11 hard negative
“that means avoiding tools like **BlackLine** and **Workiva** unless the business has enough accounting complexity and budget to justify them” Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt
Trintech
86%
12 of 14 labels negative · 9 of 12 models · 10 hard negative
“OneStream & Trintech (formerly HFM): These are massive platforms... difficult to manage without a team of full-time consultants.” Qwen 3.7 Flash, negative prompt

What they cite

Citations exist only for the models that return a source list: fourteen of the twelve in this edition, and all six flagship models on the expanded tier.

Sites the answers cite

78 of 84 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 14 of 12 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 1078 links across 254 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page.

vendor site · Numeric46 answers · 78 citations · 13 models
vendor site · G242 answers · 70 citations · 13 models
vendor site · G238 answers · 42 citations · 13 models
vendor site · DOKKA27 answers · 29 citations · 12 models
vendor site · Guideflow23 answers · 25 citations · 10 models
20 answers · 28 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Prophix20 answers · 20 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Datarails18 answers · 23 citations · 11 models
vendor site · HubiFi17 answers · 22 citations · 7 models
17 answers · 17 citations · 8 models
vendor site · HighRadius16 answers · 19 citations · 10 models
15 answers · 19 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 financial close management software”, “close management tools”, “financial close management software”. 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
Numeric numeric.io25%21812,10038,00694,254$42693
FloQast floqast.com19%3779,90019441,324$5,03976
Double doublehq.com6%24135,000350,3135,86011
QuickBooks quickbooks.ninja
QuickBooks Online 6%
6%6211,000,00054,681253 company
Datarails datarails.com5%3036,60013418,964$16,697107
LiveFlow liveflow.com5%951,3001994,8464
Xero xero.com5%73790,5004,6101,200,289$500119
Easy Month End easymonthend.com5%15100776
Planful planful.com5%3413,600685,72658,997$137120
Financial Cents financial-cents.com3%165,4005417,97419

Google's top ten for the three searches hold 15 sites; 4 of them are among the sites the models cited here (g2.com, highradius.com, hubifi.com, numeric.io). The first result for “best financial close management software” is bcsprosoft.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 financial close management software for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which month-end close software would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top close management tools for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best financial close management software for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating a financial close management software. What should we look at?”Negative“Which close management tools should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5FloQast
Three alternativesCube, Datarails, Zoho Books
FloQast, XeroChanged
One alternativeHubiFi
FloQast
Three alternativesDatarails, LiveFlow, Numeric
Wave, Zoho Books
Two alternativesDatarails, Xero
no first choiceagainst: BlackLine, FloQast, OneStream, Oracle Financial Consolidation and Close Cloud, Redwood, SAP Group Reporting
GPT-5.4 miniFloQast
Three alternativesBlackLine, ComplyBar, LiveFlow
QuickBooks Online, XeroChanged
Two alternativesFinancial Cents, Numeric
against: BlackLine
HubSpot, Pipedrive
Two alternativesFreshsales, Zoho CRM
against: Salesforce
FloQast, LiveFlowagainst: BlackLineno first choicenothing named
Gemini 3.5 FlashNumeric
Three alternativesDouble, FloQast, LiveFlow
against: BlackLine, OneStream, Oracle Financial Consolidation and Close
Finlens, KeeperChanged
Two alternativesLedge, Numeric
against: BlackLine, Workiva
Double
Three alternativesFloQast, Numeric, Trintech Adra
against: BlackLine, Oracle Financial Consolidation and Close
Easy Month End
Three alternativesKeeper, Numeric, SkyStem ART
against: BlackLine, FloQast
Keeper, Numeric
One alternativeNominal
against: BlackLine, FloQast, OneStream, Oracle Fusion Cloud EPM
against: Abacum, BlackLine, Cube, Datarails, FloQast, OneStream, Oracle NetSuite, SAP, Sage Intacct, Trintech, Workiva
Perplexity SonarFloQast
Two alternativesCube, Numeric
NumericChanged
Two alternativesEasy Month End, FloQast
no first choiceEasy Month End, Planful
One alternativeNumeric
no first choiceagainst: BlackLine, Workiva
Grok 4.1 FastDatarails, Double
Two alternativesPlanful, Prophix
against: BlackLine
NumericChanged
Two alternativesDatarails, Easy Month End
against: BlackLine, FloQast
no first choiceFinancial Cents
Two alternativesEasy Month End, Finlens
against: BlackLine, FloQast
no first choiceagainst: BlackLine, DOKKA Close, FloQast, OneStream, Trintech, Vena, Workiva
Mistral SmallFloQast, Numeric
Two alternativesBluecopa, Xero
Datarails, ProphixChanged
One alternativeTrintech Adra
against: BlackLine
no first choicePlanful
Two alternativesDOKKA Close, Double
no first choiceagainst: BlackLine, OneStream, Trintech, Workiva
DeepSeek V4 FlashFloQast
Two alternativesQuickBooks Online, Sage Intacct
against: BlackLine, Numeric, OneStream, Trintech
QuickBooks Online, XeroChanged
Two alternativesEasy Month End, FloQast
against: Sage Intacct
FloQast, Numeric
One alternativeCube
against: BlackLine, HighRadius
Numeric
Two alternativesExcel, PivotXL
against: BlackLine, DOKKA Close, FloQast, Workiva
FloQast, Numeric
Two alternativesAsana, Monday.com
against: BlackLine, OneStream, Workiva
against: Affinity, BlackLine, Close, DealCloud, JD Edwards, Oracle, SAP, Trintech, Workiva
Llama 4 MaverickDouble
One alternativeRedwood
ProphixChanged
Two alternativesClient Hub, Datarails
no first choicePlanful
One alternativeDouble
no first choicenothing named
Qwen 3.7 FlashFloQast
Two alternativesLiveFlow, Sage Intacct
against: BlackLine
DatarailsChanged
Three alternativesNumeric, QuickBooks Online, Xero
Trello
Four alternativesAsana, ClickUp, Monday.com, Notion
Excel, Google Sheets, Numeric
One alternativeCredset
against: BlackLine, FloQast
FloQastagainst: BlackLine, OneStreamagainst: BlackLine, Excel, OneStream, Trintech, Workiva
Kimi K2Numeric
Two alternativesFloQast, Sage Intacct
against: BlackLine
Finlens, QuickBooks OnlineChanged
Two alternativesNumeric.io, Xero
against: BlackLine, FloQast
FloQast, Numeric
Two alternativesDigits Core, Vena
against: BlackLine, Cube, Trintech, Workiva
Numeric
Three alternativesFinancial Cents, Finlens, Xenett
against: BlackLine, FloQast, OneStream, Prophix, Trintech
Numeric
Two alternativesFloQast, Trintech Adra
against: BlackLine, OneStream, Oracle Financial Consolidation and Close, SAP FCCS
against: BlackLine, FloQast, OneStream, Prophix, Trintech, Vena, Workiva
GLM 4.7 FlashXFloQast, LiveFlow
One alternativeDatarails
against: Workiva
Financial CentsChanged
Four alternativesBench, Pilot, QuickBooks Online, Xero
Close
Six alternativesCapsule CRM, HubSpot, Less Annoying CRM, Pipedrive, Zoho CRM, monday CRM
Double
Three alternativesFinancial Cents, Joiin, Xero
against: Planful, Prophix
no first choiceagainst: BlackLine, ClickUp, Jira, OneStream, Trintech, Workiva
MiniMax M2.5Numeric
Three alternativesDouble, LiveFlow, Puzzle
against: BlackLine
QuickBooks OnlineChanged
One alternativeDatarails
against: Xero
Double, Numeric
One alternativeFloQast
against: BlackLine
Numeric
Three alternativesEasy Month End, Financial Cents, TallyPrime
FloQast
One alternativeBlackLine
against: BlackLine, CCH Tagetik, FreshBooks, OneStream, QuickBooks Online, SAP Cloud ERP, Trintech, Workiva, Xero
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. Full answer text is in the free responses file. Download the record
Seventy-two rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
PromptModelVersion stringTime (UTC)SearchedSourcesLatency
Direct recommendationClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 10:35yes97 s
Direct recommendationGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:15yes25 s
Direct recommendationGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 08:21yes1327 s
Direct recommendationPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 07:42yes174 s
Direct recommendationGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 10:07yes2310 s
Direct recommendationMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 10:33yes55 s
Direct recommendationDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 09:39yes2235 s
Direct recommendationLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 07:40yes52 s
Direct recommendationQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 08:07yes834 s
Direct recommendationKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 10:13yes617 s
Direct recommendationGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 09:04yes1975 s
Direct recommendationMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 08:45yes1261 s
ParaphraseClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 07:55yes158 s
ParaphraseGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 09:45yes45 s
ParaphraseGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:07yes2228 s
ParaphrasePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 09:54yes196 s
ParaphraseGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 07:55yes217 s
ParaphraseMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 08:28yes54 s
ParaphraseDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 10:06yes2428 s
ParaphraseLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 10:35yes58 s
ParaphraseQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 11:09yes857 s
ParaphraseKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 08:20yes1515 s
ParaphraseGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 11:13yes2441 s
ParaphraseMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 10:06yes1727 s
ComparativeClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 09:42yes99 s
ComparativeGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 09:02no04 s
ComparativeGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 08:08yes2527 s
ComparativePerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 08:56yes245 s
ComparativeGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 09:42yes2210 s
ComparativeMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 07:38yes2011 s
ComparativeDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 09:32yes2344 s
ComparativeLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 08:01yes51 s
ComparativeQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 09:09no028 s
ComparativeKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 10:41yes1925 s
ComparativeGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 11:09yes1833 s
ComparativeMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 09:28yes1436 s
Budget constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 07:59yes188 s
Budget constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:33yes35 s
Budget constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:08yes1423 s
Budget constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 10:19yes182 s
Budget constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 08:30yes218 s
Budget constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 08:12yes53 s
Budget constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 09:09yes2128 s
Budget constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 08:51yes52 s
Budget constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 09:29yes2179 s
Budget constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 08:20yes1533 s
Budget constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 09:48yes2340 s
Budget constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 08:57yes918 s
Scale constrainedClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 07:40no05 s
Scale constrainedGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:44no05 s
Scale constrainedGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 10:10yes1723 s
Scale constrainedPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 11:10yes165 s
Scale constrainedGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 09:00yes138 s
Scale constrainedMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 11:22no06 s
Scale constrainedDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 09:44yes2143 s
Scale constrainedLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 09:58yes53 s
Scale constrainedQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 07:38no038 s
Scale constrainedKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 10:25yes2328 s
Scale constrainedGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 07:46yes1316 s
Scale constrainedMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 07:57yes517 s
Negative framingClaude Haiku 4.5claude-haiku-4-5-202510012026-10-01 09:49yes188 s
Negative framingGPT-5.4 minigpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-172026-10-01 08:06yes46 s
Negative framingGemini 3.5 Flashgemini-3.5-flash2026-10-01 08:55yes920 s
Negative framingPerplexity Sonarsonar2026-10-01 09:02yes213 s
Negative framingGrok 4.1 Fastspacexai/grok-4.1-fast-non-reasoning via vertex2026-10-01 09:40yes238 s
Negative framingMistral Smallmistral/mistral-small via mistral2026-10-01 11:19yes54 s
Negative framingDeepSeek V4 Flashdeepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra2026-10-01 10:14yes2249 s
Negative framingLlama 4 Maverickmeta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock2026-10-01 10:07yes52 s
Negative framingQwen 3.7 Flashalibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba2026-10-01 09:18yes529 s
Negative framingKimi K2moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita2026-10-01 08:07yes2331 s
Negative framingGLM 4.7 FlashXzai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai2026-10-01 08:24yes2345 s
Negative framingMiniMax M2.5minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax2026-10-01 09:30yes1653 s

Normalization in this category

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

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Category-scoped readings
Adra by Trintech read as Trintech Adra
DOKKA read as DOKKA Close
Dokka read as DOKKA Close
Finance Automation by Redwood read as Redwood
HubSpot CRM read as HubSpot
NetSuite read as Oracle NetSuite
Oracle FCCS read as Oracle Financial Consolidation and Close
Prophix One read as Prophix
Vena Solutions read as Vena
Unresolved, counted raw
Affinity
BigContacts
ComplyBar
Credset
Digits Core
Insightly
Ledgerly Starter
Less Annoying CRM
Netgain NetClose
Numeric.io
Oracle Financial Consolidation and Close Cloud
SAP FCCS
Trimly
Xero Advisor / Intuit
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.
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