How ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity recommend UK professional firms: a study of 1,000 independent practices (2026)

We asked three AI answer engines (ChatGPT with web search, Google Gemini and Perplexity) to name the best firms in a given field and town, and to describe individual firms, for 1,000 independent UK professional services firms in six sectors and 15 towns and cities. 928 (93%) firms were not named by any engine when the engines were asked for the best firms in the firm's own town and field; 11 were named by all three. The engines rarely agreed: of the 72 firms named at all, 46 were named by only one engine. The number of Google reviews was the clearest dividing line between firms that were and were not recommended. Most firms were known to the engines when asked about by name (757 (76%) were described by all three), so the gap is in recommendation rather than recognition. Half of the sources the engines cited (50%) were the firm's own website. We release the anonymised firm-level data and the exact questions. Files: report (PDF), anonymised firm-level data (CSV), summary tables, exact questions (README). Plain-English write-up: kelriva.ai.