# Compensation benchmarking data for small business 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 a small B2B company. Page: https://hr-ai-index.com/rewards/compensation-benchmarking-data/smb/

**Standing:** Pave leads with 30% of first choices; verdict contested. 60 first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts.

## First-choice share

| # | Product | Share | Negative rate | Labels |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pave | 30% | 0% | 34 |
| 2 | Payscale | 12% | 24% | 38 |
| 3 | Comprehensive.io | 8% | 0% | 21 |
| 4 | Salary.com CompAnalyst | 7% | 3% | 32 |
| 5 | Ravio | 2% | 4% | 23 |
| 6 | Mercer Total Remuneration Survey | 2% | 83% | 30 |
| 7 | Glassdoor | 0% | 45% | 11 |
| 8 | Willis Towers Watson | 0% | 100% | 10 |
| 9 | Radford | 0% | 81% | 26 |

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

- Claude Haiku 4.5: Salary.com CompAnalyst; alternatives Brightmine, Payscale
- GPT-5.4 mini: Payscale; alternatives Salary.com CompAnalyst, SalaryCube
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: Pave; alternatives Carta Total Compensation, Comprehensive.io, Figures, Ravio
- Perplexity Sonar: Pave; alternatives Payscale, Ravio, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- Grok 4.1 Fast: Pave; alternatives Ravio, SalaryCube
- Mistral Small: Pave; alternatives Salary.com CompAnalyst
- DeepSeek V4 Flash: Comprehensive.io, Pave; alternatives Ravio, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- Llama 4 Maverick: Salary.com CompAnalyst
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: Payscale; alternatives Equitable, Fount
- Kimi K2: OpenComp, Pave, Salary.com CompAnalyst; alternatives Bureau of Labor Statistics, Levels.fyi, Payscale
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: Pave; alternatives Payscale, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- MiniMax M2.5: Payscale Ascent, Ravio; alternatives PayLab, Salary.com CompAnalyst
- GPT-6 Luna: Pave Market Data Lite; alternatives Carta Total Compensation, Payscale
- Muse Glimmer 30B: Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, OEWS; alternatives CompAnalyst, Comprehensive.io, Pave, Ravio

## 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: 44 answers, 110 citations
- pin.com: 33 answers, 33 citations
- comprehensive.io: 28 answers, 36 citations
- peoplemanagingpeople.com: 25 answers, 26 citations
- zipdo.co: 19 answers, 47 citations
- g2.com: 19 answers, 20 citations
- fitsmallbusiness.com: 17 answers, 18 citations
- gitnux.org: 16 answers, 19 citations

Pages named in the most answers:

- https://ravio.com/blog/compensation-benchmarking-companies (39 answers)
- https://pin.com/blog/salary-benchmarking-tools (33 answers)
- https://peoplemanagingpeople.com/services/best-compensation-benchmarking-companies (23 answers)
- https://comprehensive.io/content/best-compensation-benchmarking-data-sources (21 answers)
- https://fitsmallbusiness.com/salary-comparison-tools (15 answers)
- https://captivateiq.com/blog/compensation-benchmarking-software (13 answers)
- https://g2.com/categories/salary-benchmarking/small-business (13 answers)
- https://ravio.com/blog/best-compensation-management-software (13 answers)
- https://us.fitgap.com/search/salary-benchmarking-software/small-business (13 answers)
- https://deel.com/blog/salary-benchmarking-tools (12 answers)

## Warned against

- Mercer Total Remuneration Survey: 25 of 30 labels negative. "Providers to avoid or use carefully include: - Mercer, Willis Towers Watson (WTW), and Radford when the budget is tight, since SMB-oriented guidance explicitly says to skip these "heavyweights"" (Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt)
- Radford: 21 of 26 labels negative. "explicitly advise skipping these providers unless you have a significant budget and need deep integration capabilities" (Mistral Small, negative prompt)
- Willis Towers Watson: 10 of 10 labels negative. "explicitly says to skip these "heavyweights" unless you have room for enterprise-level spend and integration costs" (Perplexity Sonar, negative prompt)
- Payscale: 9 of 38 labels negative. ""Avoid: Large annual subscriptions from providers like PayScale (~$13,888+/year median for SMBs)"" (Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt)

## Movement since September 2026

Floor: 13 points of share, measured on the calibration repeat.
Same leader: Pave at 30%.

- Payscale: 4% to 13%, +9. Inside the floor by 4 points · rank 4 → 2 of 143.
- Comprehensive.io: 2% to 8%, +5. Inside the floor by 8 points · rank 8 → 4 of 143.
- Bureau of Labor Statistics: 6% to 4%, −3. Inside the floor by 10 points · rank 3 → 5 of 143.
- Levels.fyi: 2% to 0%, −2. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 19 → 30 of 143.
- Mercer Total Remuneration Survey: 0% to 2%, +2. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 156 → 24 of 143.
- Pave: 32% to 30%, −2. Inside the floor by 11 points · rank 1 of 143, unchanged.
- Salary.com CompAnalyst: 9% to 8%, −1. Inside the floor by 12 points · rank 2 → 3 of 143.
- Ravio: 2% to 2%, ±0. Inside the floor by 13 points · rank 7 of 143, unchanged.
- Culpepper Compensation Surveys: 2% to 2%, ±0. Inside the floor by 13 points · rank 12 → 11 of 143.
- Glassdoor: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 13 points · rank 62 → 139 of 143.
- Radford: 0% to 0%, ±0. Inside the floor by 13 points · rank 157 → 143 of 143.

## 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.