Data
Our published Claim Registry contains 83 dated entries, each linked to its evidence. It is an inventory of claims, not a count of independent studies. Read the Claim Registry.
Read and reuse the evidence
The report brings the published studies together. The Claim Registry traces 83 dated entries to their sources. Public downloads are available without a fee or form.
The registered field test sets out how we will assess evidence and editorial refresh. Its protocol is registered; it has no outcomes yet. These records are not peer-review endorsements or guarantees of future answers.
Reuse the September Index
Read the pages cited in each category, or download the September 2026 benchmark with its schema and citation file. These records describe observed answers on stated dates, not a ranking or a prediction of future answers.
Study 7. CC BY 4.0.
The AI Written RFP
Prepared by the Broadcastwell team
2,003 category criteria from 2,093 eligible September source answers across fourteen software categories, with 10,547 exact supporting spans, 2,417 explicit vendor associations and 10,015 dated page comparisons. Team review: in progress.
Each criterion has its actual count and base, a Wilson 95 percent interval and exact source references. Vendor figures include the corresponding category median. A statement not found on the dated page is not a missing product feature; partial or unsuitable scope remains unknown.
Broadcastwell publishes its measurement data under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license (CC BY 4.0). You may copy, share and build on it. Attribute Broadcastwell and link the DOI.
A release is a fixed set of files with a version DOI on Zenodo. Each release states its own method version, engines, questions, repeat count and capture dates. A release is never edited in place. A correction gets a new version and its own DOI, and the earlier version stays online with a notice. Standings in one release are not compared with standings in another unless a study says so and shows the test.
To cite a dataset, use the "How to cite" line under its entry. Each line carries the version DOI. The DOI resolves to the record page, where the files, checksums and README live.
Datasets
The Absence Index, release 2026-09
Standings for 14 vertical B2B software categories and 286 checked vendors. Five engines answered ten buyer questions per category: ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and Google AI Mode. Each engine and question pair ran three times as scheduled repeats on 22 and 23 September 2026 (UTC). The release reports 2,250 observations: 2,100 targets and 150 controls. Five excluded target rows leave 2,095 valid target answers. Every answer is included verbatim with its cited URLs. The package holds release-2026-09.json, answers-2026-09.jsonl, 14 category CSVs, control-questions.json, a README with the data dictionary and SHA256SUMS.txt. Method v1.1. Standings only. No change between releases is asserted.
- Date: 23 September 2026
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.22907695 (concept DOI for all Index releases: 10.5281/zenodo.22150321)
- Download: https://zenodo.org/records/22907695 (site copy of the release file: https://index.broadcastwell.com/data/release-2026-09.json)
- How to cite: Broadcastwell. (2026). The Absence Index: September 2026 Release (2026-09) [Dataset]. Broadcastwell. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22907695
The Absence Index, August 2026 release
The first Index release: CRM and project management, ten checked vendors each. Four named engines answered ten questions per category, three repeats each, captured 28 August 2026: ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews. CRM has 117 valid observations of 120 (three engine errors); project management has 120. Version 2026-08.1, published 12 September 2026, corrects the citation counts and records the erratum in the release file. Answer text was not retained for this release. The zip holds the release JSON, crm.csv, project_management.csv and a README with the erratum. The first version of this release, DOI 10.5281/zenodo.22150322, is superseded and stays online with a notice.
- Date: 28 August 2026 (capture and first version); 12 September 2026 (version 2026-08.1)
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.22721962
- Download: https://zenodo.org/records/22721962 (site copy of the release file: https://index.broadcastwell.com/data/release-2026-08.json)
- How to cite: Broadcastwell. (2026). The Absence Index: August 2026 Release (2026-08.1) [Dataset]. Broadcastwell. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22721962
The 2026 State of GEO, Volume I
Ten standardized buyer questions for each of 85 B2B software companies across 61 categories, put to one AI engine with live web search between 18 and 23 July 2026. The 860 answers were scored for whether the company was named and whether its domain was cited. 5,160 citations were logged across 1,753 unique domains. Company identities are withheld (C01 to C85). Files: company_visibility_anonymized.csv (85 rows), most_named_brands_top50.csv (50 rows), cited_source_domains_top100.csv (100 rows) and the write-up.
- Date: 24 July 2026 (version 1.0)
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.21537014
- Download: https://zenodo.org/records/21537014 (files also at https://github.com/Broadcastwell/state-of-geo-2026)
- How to cite: Broadcastwell. (2026). The 2026 State of Generative Engine Optimization, Volume I (v1.0) [Dataset]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21537014
The 2026 State of GEO, Volume II: The Absence Ladder
The 616 answers from the Volume I frame in which the engine answered the buyer question without naming the company, classified by question shape and by the company's visibility tier. Files: absence_questions_classified.csv (616 rows), absence_shape_by_tier.csv (four tiers), challenger_visibility_v2.csv (85 companies). Same single-engine frame as Volume I. The Absence Manual below is built on this volume.
- Date: 26 July 2026 (version 2.0)
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.21586091
- Download: https://zenodo.org/records/21586091 (files also at https://github.com/Broadcastwell/state-of-geo-2026)
- How to cite: Broadcastwell. (2026). The 2026 State of Generative Engine Optimization, Volume II: The Absence Ladder (v2.0) [Dataset]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21586091
The 2026 State of GEO, Volume III: cross-engine divergence
280 buyer questions across 40 B2B software categories, put to four named engines on 4 August 2026: ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews. Vendor sets were extracted from each answer and agreement between engines was measured. A 25-question subsample ran three times per engine for within-engine consistency, with a length control. Engine coverage is uneven (Google AI Overviews 280 answers, Claude 273, Perplexity 175, ChatGPT 18), and every statistic carries its engine set. Files: raw.csv (821 answers), scored.csv, vendor_mentions.csv, citations.csv, questions.csv, universe.csv, results.json, the paper (State-of-GEO-Volume-III.pdf and PAPER.md) and six figures. A corrections file is kept in the GitHub repository. The paper is also posted on SSRN, abstract 7234418.
- Date: 4 August 2026 (version 3.0); SSRN posting 10 August 2026
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.21789120
- Download: https://zenodo.org/records/21789120 (data files also at https://github.com/Broadcastwell/state-of-geo-2026/tree/main/volume-iii; paper at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=7234418)
- How to cite: Broadcastwell. (2026). The 2026 State of Generative Engine Optimization, Volume III: cross-engine divergence (v3.0) [Dataset and paper]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21789120
The 2026 State of GEO on figshare
A deposit of the Volume I and Volume II files on figshare, made 31 July 2026: six CSVs, PAPER.md and five figures. The data is the same as in the Zenodo records above. The deposit is filed under the author's name, the Broadcastwell team.
- Date: 31 July 2026
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.6084/m9.figshare.33134942
- Download: https://figshare.com/articles/dataset/The_2026_State_of_Generative_Engine_Optimization/33134942
- How to cite: Sivakumar, S. (2026). The 2026 State of Generative Engine Optimization [Dataset]. figshare. https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.33134942
Hugging Face dataset: Broadcastwell/state-of-geo-2026
The six Volume I and Volume II CSVs on Hugging Face (98.6 kB), for loading with the datasets library. The data is the same as in the Zenodo records above.
- Date: 2 August 2026; last updated 22 August 2026
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: none (cite the Zenodo DOIs 10.5281/zenodo.21537014 and 10.5281/zenodo.21586091 for the underlying data)
- Download: https://huggingface.co/datasets/Broadcastwell/state-of-geo-2026
- How to cite: Broadcastwell. (2026). state-of-geo-2026 [Dataset]. Hugging Face. https://huggingface.co/datasets/Broadcastwell/state-of-geo-2026
The Absence Manual
A free technical manual on measuring vendor absence in AI answers, built on Volumes I to III. Thirteen chapters and five appendices, including the ten-question buyer bank, the classification rules, the scoring specification and a chapter on measurement noise. Version 1.0, 41 pages. Prose and figures are CC BY 4.0. The site code is MIT.
- Date: 18 August 2026 (version 1.0)
- License: CC BY 4.0 (prose and figures); MIT (site code)
- DOI: none (the Manual is built on 10.5281/zenodo.21586091)
- Download: https://docs.broadcastwell.com/absence-manual.pdf (web version: https://docs.broadcastwell.com/; source: https://github.com/Broadcastwell/absence-manual)
- How to cite: Broadcastwell. (2026). The Absence Manual (Version 1.0). Broadcastwell. https://docs.broadcastwell.com/
Study 1. The Shortlist Gap: who AI engines name when buyers ask, and who they never name
Vendor, category, engine and source-domain figures computed from the Absence Index release 2026-09: 14 categories, 286 checked vendors, 140 buyer questions, five engines, three scheduled runs per engine and question, 2,095 valid target answers. Headline: 46 of 286 checked vendors (16.1%) were never named in any of the 2,095 answers. Files: vendors_2026-09.csv, category_summary_2026-09.csv, source_domains_2026-09.csv, top10_sources_2026-09.csv, domain_classes_2026-09.csv, study1_numbers.json, vendor_rules_2026-09.json and the scripts that recompute every figure from the release package.
- Date: September 2026 (version 1.0)
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.22982426
- Download: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22982426
- How to cite: Broadcastwell Research. (2026). The Shortlist Gap: who AI engines name when buyers ask, and who they never name (Version 1.0) [Dataset and report]. Broadcastwell. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22982426
Study 2. What AI search visibility costs in 2026
Prices, guarantees and checkout paths of sellers of AI search visibility products and services, read from each seller's own live pages on 25 September 2026. 137 seller profiles were read. 123 sellers had verified in-category offer rows, including rows without a published paid price. Headline: 70 of 123 sellers (56.9%) publish a paid price. Broadcastwell sells in this market. Its own price rows are listed in a separate file and are not scored. Files: prices_2026-09-25.csv, guarantees.csv, checkout.csv, bw_prices.csv and the script that computes every figure.
- Date: September 2026 (version 1.0)
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.22982430
- Download: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22982430
- How to cite: Broadcastwell Research. (2026). What AI search visibility costs in 2026 (Version 1.0) [Dataset and report]. Broadcastwell. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22982430
Study 3. Run-to-run noise: what one AI answer tells you and what three do
Within-day repeat variation in the Absence Index release 2026-09, where each engine and question pair ran three times. A cell is one question, one engine and one checked vendor; 14,192 cells have three valid runs. Headline: 1,785 of 8,055 single-run vendor namings (22.2%) were not repeated by both other runs. Files: run_cells_2026-09.csv, vendors_by_run_2026-09.csv, study3_numbers.json and the recompute scripts. The study measures repeat variation on one day. It asserts no change over time.
- Date: September 2026 (version 1.0)
- License: CC BY 4.0
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.22982432
- Download: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22982432
- How to cite: Broadcastwell Research. (2026). Run-to-run noise: what one AI answer tells you and what three do (Version 1.0) [Dataset and report]. Broadcastwell. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22982432
The September Index covers 286 vendors, five engines and three runs; Volume I covers 85 companies and one engine. These are different samples, not a trend.
Long queries in Search Console
In Google Search Console data for 26 July to 25 October 2026, exported on 27 October 2026, 134 distinct queries of twelve words or more produced 969 impressions for broadcastwell.com. Search Console does not identify who entered those queries. These counts do not establish that an assistant performed the searches.