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CyberArk Privileged Access Manager vs StrongDM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 29, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

CyberArk Privileged Access ...
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
230
Ranking in other categories
User Activity Monitoring (1st), Enterprise Password Managers (3rd), Mainframe Security (1st), Operational Technology (OT) Security (3rd)
StrongDM
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
18th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
Access Management (18th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Privileged Access Management (PAM) category, the mindshare of CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is 10.4%, down from 18.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StrongDM is 2.5%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Privileged Access Management (PAM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
CyberArk Privileged Access Manager10.4%
StrongDM2.5%
Other87.1%
Privileged Access Management (PAM)
 

Featured Reviews

Atul-Gujar - PeerSpot reviewer
CyberArk manager at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Secures critical infrastructures with essential user session audit records
A potential area for improvement is enhancing support for cluster environments and distributed Vaults. Clients in multiple countries that need central access have different challenges that require better solutions from CyberArk. For financial services, CyberArk can improve incident response by ensuring fast support for critical priority tickets to meet compliance requirements. Providing more documentation on CyberArk is recommended for new team members to enhance their troubleshooting capabilities. I understand it's up to the client, but 99% fail to change the demo key, so it's crucial for CyberArk to emphasize changing the key and documenting it as part of the installation process.
reviewer2804475 - PeerSpot reviewer
Iam Engineer at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Access management has improved privileged logins while still needing fewer crashes and less upkeep
The best features in StrongDM are the password rotation capabilities, which I think are pretty cool, and also how you can literally log in to any of the privileged servers through a single platform. You just copy-paste the IP and the port number and log in over there through RDP, so I think that's pretty cool. I have used CyberArk before, but I think StrongDM as a product has pretty good potential. My impression of the credential-less access control is that it's pretty good because it reduces the attack surface. Basically, if you cannot see the password and everything, even the privileged users cannot see the password. It's a password-less system where you just log in to the servers without knowing your password, and even if you know your password, it's probably going to be rotated after a while. So, I think that's a pretty good use case for reducing the attack surface and maintaining zero trust throughout an identity perimeter. StrongDM helps with runtime features in a twenty-four-seven dynamic environment. Whenever I try to access at maybe two a.m. or three a.m. at night and I have a production issue on a server located in a different continent, I can access it right at that moment. I think the application works pretty much like a charm. It's readily available, and I think the runtime feature is pretty cool, although the application sometimes crashes when it's downloaded locally on your machine. Regarding pricing, I find StrongDM to be definitely cost-efficient. We used to use CyberArk before, but StrongDM is more cost-effective, which is why we are using it. Our director is a board member at StrongDM, allowing us to utilize the product and the flexibility it provides, which tailor-suits our needs based on the organization and is something we do not get from other PAM products.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"CyberArk is a more secure product - much better than Thycotic."
"We can make a policy that affects everybody instantly."
"It has a centralized page where you can manage everything, making work easier because you don't have to remember different module URLs or browser applications, and it is very easy to get all the secure identities of other environments into a single page, which is very important for us as it helps a lot in terms of operations, e.g., reduces management time."
"I would recommend implementing CyberArk Privileged Access Manager as it is the best so far."
"We have accomplished our security goals. We have two-factor authenticated and vaulted our important accounts, so people can't just steal stuff from us."
"PSM enables after-hours monitoring."
"We like it for the ability to automatically change passwords. At least for my group, that's the best thing."
"It enables us to secure accounts and make sure they are compliant."
"The best features in StrongDM are that it is the easiest product in the market for this situation with easy access."
"We primarily used StrongDM for access to resources on private networks like EC2 machines, Kubernetes clusters, and various databases."
"StrongDM replaced the puzzle of different solutions with one single product, which made managing resources more efficient."
"All of the logging is handled for us, including for auditing purposes. Looking through the audit logs is not a painful experience."
"The best features in StrongDM are the password rotation capabilities, which I think are pretty cool, and also how you can literally log in to any of the privileged servers through a single platform."
 

Cons

"Password Vault is much pricier than other solutions. A vendor team might struggle to explain why that price is justified. There are good alternatives that cost less."
"The PTA could be improved. Currently, companies often have multiple domains and sometimes it's difficult to implement CyberArk in this kind of infrastructure."
"The reporting should be improved. There should be more customization. The report should show how we are going to mitigate the risk because we cannot show the system environment to each and every auditor."
"The interface could be improved it is not user-friendly, but they have improved but it could still improve."
"The tool's UI has bugs and lags. It needs to be improved. The deployment process can be complex due to multiple components for various functionalities, each requiring separate infrastructure management. To simplify this process, consolidating all these components into a single platform could be beneficial. The product's pricing could be cheaper."
"It should be easy to use for non-technical people. Its interface can be a bit difficult."
"The scalability, sometimes, is lacking. It works really well for more static environments... But for an environment where you're constantly spinning up new infrastructure or new endpoints, sometimes it has a hard time keeping up."
"CyberArk Enterprise Password Vault must incorporate connectors for password and session managers in the marketplace."
"It would be beneficial to have better control and alignment between frequent updates and improved communication regarding possible negative effects on existing customer bases."
"We've had a few issues with the stability of this product in the past."
"It would be beneficial to have better control and alignment between frequent updates and improved communication regarding possible negative effects on existing customer bases."
"I rate the stability of the product five out of ten because crashes sometimes happen when we are working on it."
"I think the stability of StrongDM is about four to five due to the occasional crashes that I mentioned."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If you want a Ferrari, it will cost you. The solution is really nice, so it costs the client, but in the long run, it is very good. If you buy a solution that costs a lot to maintain because it is not stable, and you are frequently asking for consultant support, it costs more."
"Our risk is definitely significantly lower. Also, our resources are low."
"The main problem for the tool is its licensing. I work for a really big company. When you try to develop this as a service, usually you work with leverage teams who are formed with dozens of members. You might dedicate one FTE, or less, for something, e.g., an antivirus administrator. You might have half an FTE's effort dedicated to administering the antivirus, but then you have a team of about 30 users who might access that ticket. The problem is that CyberArk eliminated the possibility of concurrent users years ago. This is a big problem for companies who work with leverage teams. You need to pay for everyone. 40 licenses are used by 20 or 30 people. This is a big problem because licenses are not precisely cheap."
"The license CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is on an annual basis."
"CyberArk provides all the features bundled. This is compared to other vendors who provide them as a different license for each functionality."
"CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is more expensive than its competitors, such as BeyondTrust, Delinea, and ManageEngine PAM360."
"I have heard from my leaders that CyberArk is costlier in terms of licensing. The support and maintenance are also costly. We use their premium support, but for the price we pay, we do not get the value."
"The price of this solution is quite reasonable."
"The licensing is per user per month."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
15%
University
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business60
Midsize Enterprise42
Large Enterprise174
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

How does Sailpoint IdentityIQ compare with CyberArk PAM?
We evaluated Sailpoint IdentityIQ before ultimately choosing CyberArk. Sailpoint Identity Platform is a solution to manage risks in cloud enterprise environments. It automates and streamlines the m...
What do you like most about CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?
The most valuable features of the solution are control and analytics.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?
My thoughts on the pricing of CyberArk Privileged Access Manager depend entirely on the vendors' requirements. If they want their things to be secure, they have to spend accordingly. We have four t...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for StrongDM?
The leadership chose StrongDM after comparative research, which suggests economic benefits. It was mentioned that while the product is rapidly gaining features, it might become cost-prohibitive for...
What needs improvement with StrongDM?
StrongDM regularly requires patches and maintenance, but I think that's a good question for the PAM architects in our organization. If you guys could offer only a cloud-native solution, you would l...
What is your primary use case for StrongDM?
My use case for StrongDM is Privileged Access Management. I have privileged accounts because I am working for the Identity and Access Management team at my company. As an engineer, I have really pr...
 

Also Known As

CyberArk Privileged Access Security, CyberArk Enterprise Password Vault
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Rockwell Automation
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about CyberArk Privileged Access Manager vs. StrongDM and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
892,383 professionals have used our research since 2012.