Hair Loss Treatments: AI Visibility Market Discovery Index

Benchmark Summary

Rogaine leads the Hair Loss Treatments benchmark in October 2026 with valid recommendation coverage of 59.3%, up from 56.4% in July 2026. Nutrafol holds second position at 55.1% in October 2026, a gap of 4.2 percentage points behind the leader. The largest coverage increase since baseline came from Ro, which rose to 18.2% in October 2026 from 0.0% in July 2026. The largest coverage decline was recorded by Ro (Roman), falling to 0.0% in October 2026 from 19.8% in July 2026.

No brand recorded a significant move in October 2026 itself. Most tracked brands held within normal month-to-month variation. Rogaine extended its lead over a two-month upward streak, while Propecia (Merck) declined for a third consecutive month. Ro continued its rise from a September 2026 entry point.

The benchmark began with 800 prompt-surface observations in each month and produced 528 qualified observations in October 2026 after qualification.

Current Benchmark at a Glance

Qualified surface breadth counts the canonical AI/search surface families with at least one qualified observation. The six families tested are ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, AI Overviews, and AI Mode.

September 2026 qualified observations were 551, between the July 2026 baseline and the October 2026 current month.

For the strategic interpretation of this benchmark, read CiteWorks Studio's analysis of How AI Search Is Recommending Hair Loss Treatments

Research Scope and Qualification

Questions This Section Answers

• How many of the 800 source prompt-surface observations qualified for the October 2026 public benchmark?
• What does the qualification funnel show about off-topic observations over time?

The public benchmark is narrower than the raw collection universe by design.

Brand-level percentages use the qualified observations as the public denominator, not the raw collection. See the AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology.

Current Brand Standings

Questions This Section Answers

• Which brands lead the Hair Loss Treatments benchmark on valid recommendation coverage?
• How do presence rate and valid recommendation coverage differ across the tracked brands?
• Which hair loss brands rank first most often in October 2026?

How to Read the Standings

• Presence rate: Share of qualified observations where the brand is mentioned or appears in the AI answer.
• Valid recommendation coverage: Share of qualified observations where the brand appears in a recommendation that meets benchmark criteria.
• Top-three rate: Share of qualified observations where the brand appears among the top three recommended options.
• Rank-one rate: Share of qualified observations where the brand is the single top recommendation.
• Net sentiment: Positive mentions minus negative mentions divided by total brand mentions in the current month.

For formulas and denominator rules, see AI Visibility Market Discovery Metric Definitions.

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Questions This Section Answers

• Which brand recorded the largest coverage increase since the July 2026 baseline?
• What happened to Propecia (Merck) coverage across the three months of the series?
• How did Rogaine extend its lead over the two months before October 2026?

Largest Increase: Ro

Ro entered the benchmark series in September 2026 and rose to 18.2% valid recommendation coverage in October 2026, up 18.2 percentage points from a 0.0% July 2026 baseline and beyond normal month-to-month variation. The brand moved up in each of the two months it has been tracked. Ro's presence rate reached 23.9% in October 2026, with a top-three rate of 13.5% and a rank-one rate of 1.1%. Net sentiment was 0.8 in October 2026.

Ro replaced Ro (Roman) as the canonical brand name in the September 2026 benchmark records. Ro (Roman), tracked through August 2026 at 17.5% coverage, recorded 0.0% in October 2026 as the brand identity shifted to Ro. The gap between Ro and Ro (Roman) widened in each of the four months of the series, from -19.8 in July 2026 to 18.2 in October 2026.

Largest Decline: Propecia (Merck)

Propecia (Merck) declined in each of the three months since July 2026, with valid recommendation coverage falling to 22.4% in October 2026 from 37.1% in July 2026, a drop of 14.7 percentage points and beyond normal month-to-month variation. Supporting signals moved in the same direction. Presence rate fell to 45.6% in October 2026 from 70.4% in July 2026, and net sentiment fell to 0.6 in October 2026 from 0.8 in July 2026. Top-three placement fell to 17.6% from 19.6%, and rank-one placement fell to 7.0% from 7.4%.

Category Leader: Rogaine

Rogaine held the leading valid recommendation coverage position in October 2026 at 59.3%, up from 56.4% in July 2026, moving upward in each of the last two months. Nutrafol was second at 55.1% in October 2026, and Hims was third at 53.4%. Rogaine also led on top-three placement at 51.1% and rank-one placement at 41.1% in October 2026.

Stable Brands

Most remaining tracked brands stayed within normal month-to-month variation. Hims moved from 47.7% in September 2026 to 53.4% in October 2026, a change of 5.7 percentage points that remained within the range the benchmark treats as normal month-to-month variation, and its movement since the July 2026 baseline also stayed within that range. Nutrafol moved upward across the last two months. Happy Head, Keeps, Bosley, HairClub, and Folexin remained within the range the benchmark treats as stable.

Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Questions This Section Answers

• How do first-position rates compare with top-three rates among the leading hair loss brands?
• Why can similar coverage levels still hide different rank-one rates for Rogaine, Hims, and Nutrafol?

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. Among the leading brands, first-position rates varied widely relative to their coverage levels.

Rogaine converted a large share of its top-three placements into first position, with a rank-one rate of 41.1% in October 2026 against a top-three rate of 51.1%. Hims held similar top-three placement at 51.3% but a rank-one rate of 20.6%, while Nutrafol's rank-one rate was 4.9%, showing that close coverage levels can still hide very different first-position rates.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

Questions This Section Answers

• Which buyer-intent class do qualified observations fall into in the current benchmark?
• Are pricing and multi-brand comparison observations included in the public series yet?

All qualified observations in both months fell into the Brand Recommendation class, covering discovery and consideration of hair loss treatments.

The current public series measures brand recommendation discovery and does not yet contain qualified observations in the pricing and value or multi-brand comparison classes.

Historical Measurement Record

Questions This Section Answers

• Which brand has led the benchmark across all four monthly records?
• What does the available history show about the largest coverage movements each month?

Evidence and Source Layer

The benchmark is built from prompt-level observations that retain the query, AI/search surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and, where exposed, citations or attributable evidence sources. Source presence is evidence about the information environment. It is not automatically proof that the source caused the recommendation.

Scope Boundaries

This public benchmark does not measure market share, attributable sales, every possible AI response, organic-search ranking, social mention volume, private or sponsored channels, or causality from a metric movement alone.

Top 10 Cited Domains

Questions This Section Answers

• Which domains receive the most citations across the tracked AI platforms?
• Which brand domain appears in the top 10, and on how many platforms is it cited?
• What share of all citations do the top 10 domains account for?

The benchmark recorded 7,454 citations across 1,504 unique domains in October 2026.

Citations are distributed across a wide field of domains, with the top 10 accounting for roughly 28% of all citations and the leading domain at 5.5%. Hims holds the only tracked brand domain in the top 10, appearing at rank 3 and cited by all six tracked AI platforms. Health and medical reference sources dominate the rest of the list, including healthline.com, ncoa.org, goodrx.com, webmd.com, and mayoclinic.org.

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Visibility Market Discovery Index tracks how often and how prominently brands appear in AI-generated recommendations across six major AI and search surfaces. It is a neutral industry benchmark built from qualified prompt-level observations.

• AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology
• AI Visibility Market Discovery Metric Definitions
• AI Visibility Market Discovery Research Standards
• Modeled AI Visibility Authority Value

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