# Compensation benchmarking data for enterprise buyers: what AI models recommend, October 2026

HR AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition. Asked as "salary benchmarking data provider" and as "compensation survey data", six framings each, to fourteen models with search on, on behalf of an enterprise B2B company. Page: https://hr-ai-index.com/rewards/compensation-benchmarking-data/enterprise/

**Standing:** Mercer Total Remuneration Survey leads with 44% of first choices; verdict clear leader. 55 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| # | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mercer Total Remuneration Survey | 44% | 25% | 55 |
| 2 | Radford | 16% | 30% | 33 |
| 3 | Pave | 5% | 21% | 19 |
| 4 | SalaryCube | 5% | 14% | 14 |
| 5 | Willis Towers Watson | 5% | 34% | 29 |
| 6 | Payscale | 4% | 26% | 35 |
| 7 | WTW | 2% | 18% | 11 |
| 8 | Korn Ferry Pay | 0% | 8% | 13 |
| 9 | Ravio | 0% | 19% | 21 |
| 10 | Salary.com CompAnalyst | 0% | 20% | 15 |
| 11 | Deloitte | 0% | 31% | 13 |
| 12 | Gartner | 0% | 31% | 16 |

## Each model's first choice on the direct prompt

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, WTW; alternatives Compa, Payscale, Salary.com CompAnalyst, beqom
- GPT-5.4 mini: Aon's Radford McLagan Compensation Database; alternatives Culpepper Compensation Surveys
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Radford; alternatives Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Pave, Payscale, WTW
- Perplexity Sonar: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey; alternatives Pave, Payscale, Ravio, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- Grok 4.1 Fast: Radford; alternatives Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Payscale, Salary.com CompAnalyst, Willis Towers Watson
- Mistral Small: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Radford, Willis Towers Watson; alternatives Lightcast, Payscale
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Radford; alternatives Korn Ferry Pay, Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Pave, SalaryCube
- Llama 4 Maverick: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Pave
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Aon's Radford McLagan Compensation Database; alternatives Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, Payfederate, Payscale, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- Kimi K2: Radford; alternatives Mercer Total Remuneration Survey, SalaryCube, Willis Towers Watson
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey; alternatives Figures, Levels.fyi, Pave, Radford
- MiniMax M2.5: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey; alternatives Payscale, Radford, WTW
- GPT-6 Luna: Aon's Radford; alternatives Mercer TRS, Pave
- Muse Glimmer 30B: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey; alternatives Aon Radford, Payscale, Salary.com CompAnalyst, Willis Towers Watson

## Sources the answers cite

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

- ravio.com: 46 answers, 144 citations
- salarycube.com: 32 answers, 57 citations
- gitnux.org: 25 answers, 45 citations
- comprehensive.io: 25 answers, 26 citations
- peoplemanagingpeople.com: 25 answers, 26 citations
- worldmetrics.org: 24 answers, 65 citations
- zipdo.co: 23 answers, 44 citations
- figures.hr: 20 answers, 24 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://ravio.com/blog/compensation-benchmarking-companies (37 answers)
- https://peoplemanagingpeople.com/services/best-compensation-benchmarking-companies (25 answers)
- https://comprehensive.io/content/best-compensation-benchmarking-data-sources (22 answers)
- https://salarycube.com/compensation/best-compensation-benchmarking-companies-for-2026-complete-guide (20 answers)
- https://pin.com/blog/salary-benchmarking-tools (18 answers)
- https://ravio.com/blog/the-best-tools-for-salary-benchmarking (18 answers)
- https://figures.hr/post/salary-benchmarking-tools (17 answers)
- https://ravio.com/blog/salary-survey-providers (17 answers)
- https://worldmetrics.org/service/corporate-benchmarking (17 answers)
- https://captivateiq.com/blog/compensation-benchmarking-software (16 answers)

## Warned against

- Mercer Total Remuneration Survey: 14 of 55 labels negative. "traditional providers like Mercer, Radford, and Willis Towers Watson should be avoided due to self-selection bias" (Llama 4 Maverick, negative prompt)
- Willis Towers Watson: 10 of 29 labels negative. "explicitly flag them as "traditional providers to avoid" for predictable costing and accuracy in high-complexity roles" (Grok 4.1 Fast, negative prompt)
- Payscale: 9 of 35 labels negative. ""Payscale (for high-complexity executive roles). Why to avoid: These platforms often suffer from "self-selection bias.""" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)
- Radford: 10 of 33 labels negative. "traditional providers like Mercer, Radford, and Willis Towers Watson should be avoided due to self-selection bias" (Llama 4 Maverick, negative prompt)

## Movement since September 2026

Floor: 13 points of share, measured on the calibration repeat.
Same leader: Mercer Total Remuneration Survey at 44%.

- Mercer Total Remuneration Survey: 30% to 44%, +14. Cleared the floor by 1 point · rank 1 of 115, unchanged.
- Willis Towers Watson: 11% to 6%, −5. Inside the floor by 8 points · rank 3 → 4 of 115.
- Korn Ferry Pay: 5% to 0%, −5. Inside the floor by 8 points · rank 5 → 14 of 115.
- Salary.com CompAnalyst: 5% to 0%, −5. Inside the floor by 8 points · rank 6 → 17 of 115.
- SalaryCube: 0% to 4%, +4. Inside the floor by 9 points · rank 29 → 6 of 115.
- Radford: 16% to 19%, +2. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 2 of 115, unchanged.
- Pave: 8% to 6%, −2. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 4 → 3 of 115.
- Ravio: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 9 → 15 of 115.
- Payscale: 3% to 4%, +1. Inside the floor by 12 points · rank 7 → 5 of 115.
- WTW: 2% to 2%, ±0. Inside the floor by 13 points · rank 10 → 8 of 115.
- Deloitte: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 13 points · rank 20 → 18 of 115.
- Bain & Company: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 13 points · rank 23 → 26 of 115.

## Record

- Method: https://hr-ai-index.com/methodology/
- Raw judge labels and full responses: https://hr-ai-index.com/data/
- License: CC BY 4.0. Cite as HR AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition, hr-ai-index.com.