Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Microsoft Entra ID vs Symantec Siteminder comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 11, 2024

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

Microsoft Entra ID
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
1st
Ranking in Access Management
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
236
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (1st), Identity Management (IM) (2nd), Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (2nd)
Symantec Siteminder
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
12th
Ranking in Access Management
11th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
75
Ranking in other categories
Web Access Management (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2025, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Entra ID is 17.0%, down from 26.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Siteminder is 2.5%, down from 3.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Entra ID17.0%
Symantec Siteminder2.5%
Other80.5%
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

Featured Reviews

Bahram Piri - PeerSpot reviewer
Security focus and seamless implementation increase platform productivity
Microsoft Entra ID can be improved in many ways, and there's a big wish list.If we're focusing on security, something that I definitely expect is improvement in the UI and UX for frontline workers. This is important, especially for non-tech savvy individuals. It is something Microsoft Entra ID could do to improve for a wider audience. It's important to focus on the frontline workers since they are non-tech savvy individuals. They are not like those back-office engineering C-level employees who are constantly dealing with computers, and we need to build a specific user experience and user interface for them to handle this stuff. That's something I expect Microsoft to focus on more for Microsoft Entra ID.
Muzi Lubisi - PeerSpot reviewer
Improved user experience with seamless integration and easy installation
The feature that I mostly valued is the ease of installation on different systems, especially on Windows. Additionally, it is very beneficial for deploying single sign-on sessions between different windows on a web browser, provided I am connected to the right identity provider. That seamless integration significantly improves user experience and efficiency.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Every feature in Microsoft Entra ID plays a crucial role in overall security."
"Coming from a traditional on-premises Active Directory infrastructure, it is purely a SaaS platform. It is global. It is evergreen. It is always evolving. It is core to the Microsoft Ecosystem."
"User and device management is the most valuable feature."
"We like the ease of app registrations and single sign-on with Entra ID. It offers an easy way to add multi-factor authentication to nearly any application and system."
"The solution is free to use and you can use it for every service."
"What I appreciate the most about Microsoft Entra ID is that it integrates seamlessly with other Microsoft products, which streamlines the process."
"The ability to see and control PCs and mobile devices is the most valuable. I can see where they are and how many we have. I can also see the age and retention of PCs."
"Overall the solution functions very well, such as the ability to access it from the cloud."
"Ease of use is very good, for administrating it. It's very well known."
"Right now, federation that comes out-of-the-box with single sign-on is the most valuable feature that we have, and also scalability."
"It's quite scalable."
"The solution has features that allow you to easily distinguish between protected and unprotected resources."
"A valuable feature of Siteminder is the way it handles bulk traffic. The features it has, in terms of routing the traffic and load balancing, are good."
"Siteminder allows us to manage identity and portability control efficiently."
"It has the ability to authenticate and authorize users. It is the main feature for our security."
"I liked the debugging part. There are only two files (trace file and log file) that you need to look into while performing debugging, and the logs give you the exact info on where and what needs to be fixed."
 

Cons

"For example, there were some authentication features that, for security purposes, had certain limitations. Those limitations still exist, but the portal now has options so that the customers can make custom features to manage their identity."
"Entra could be improved by enhancing self-service options for end users, such as making password reset options more accessible."
"In my opinion, Microsoft sometimes releases products too early without providing enough documentation. Our team works with innovative solutions like verified ID, identity governance ,and lifecycle workflow. When we started with lifecycle workflows, we had only two integrated worklows. Still, we couldn't find much of the information we needed in the documentation about our use case or how to leverage IDs in our proof of concept."
"Our organization's approach to defending against token theft and nation-state attacks has not changed significantly since implementing Microsoft Entra ID, as we have a big concern about token theft yet know we cannot do anything."
"I would evaluate Microsoft support as three out of ten. Microsoft support does not engage right away."
"They have had a few outages, so stability is a little bit of an issue. It is global. That is the thing. I know some of the other competitors are regionalized ID platforms, but Entra ID is global, so when something goes wrong, it is a problem because it underpins everything, whether you are logging in to M365 or you have single sign-on to Azure, Autopilot, Intune, Exchange mailbox or another application. If there is a problem with Entra ID, all of that falls apart, so its great strength and weakness is the global single tenant for it. Stability is a key area for me. Otherwise, it is generally pretty good."
"The implementation of other third-party MFA such as Okta or Duo could be improved, even though Duo is integratable. The response from actual support tickets is a bit laggy, and I would like them to be more responsive."
"The cost of licensing always has room for improvement."
"I'd like to see a rework of the user directory configuration."
"We would like to the OAuth be more stable, more issues being fixed rather than not."
"The support could be faster."
"Some of the new protocols, like OAuth 2.0, could be improved."
"CA has reporting at the moment. With the reporting, every particular segmented product has a reporting engine. I would like to see centralized reporting for all of them together."
"They need to make configurations easier, and not have the engineer having to guess what will happen when he changes a particular setting."
"Better documentation. I went through some sessions on single sign-on for version 12.7."
"The Federation part of CA Single Sign On, it's a bit complex to implement because it involves the SSL certificates, exchange of certificates, and lot of technical details. The documentation misses some important parts of this, so that's the reason it took some time for us to go live."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution costs us 60,000 Rupees annually, just over $700, and there are no additional costs."
"There are add-on components and services, such as identity services, that we have to add to our Azure subscription. Only then can I actually say it's on par with the on-prem server edition. Why should I pay for a component? It should be included in my subscription."
"The pricing depends on the use case and can be negotiated based on volume."
"For a small business buying individual licenses, it is an affordable solution."
"Our customers are looking for advanced features and processes for it to be cost-effective for their organizations. They see it as an overpriced product. They are enjoying using Azure Active Directory, but they are looking for better prices."
"The price of the solution's license is good."
"The solution was fairly priced the last time I checked the costs."
"Pricing-wise, they offer a stepladder approach. You can start with the lowest level features, then start increasing based on new requirements."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"The solution's pricing is competitive."
"The price is quite comparable to the other enterprise-level solutions in that market."
"Symantec Siteminder is expensive; they could definitely do better on the price."
"Siteminder is a little costly. You pay for licensing, and they offer packages, so if you have less users, then you have to buy different products at different prices. If you have more of a user base, then the package is different. They also include other features—for example, if you have a database and you're using Siteminder, then it's good to use a Semantic-specific database, but if you are using less, then you have to purchase the database separately. Whereas if you are going for a bigger license, then it comes within the package. It depends on which plan you are using."
"I recommend conducting a PoC on every available product before choose one."
"The licensing is fair for this solution."
"CA solutions are generally expensive but for the customer the ROI is big."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Single Sign-On (SSO) solutions are best for your needs.
873,085 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
29%
Insurance Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business80
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise132
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise69
 

Questions from the Community

How does Duo Security compare with Microsoft Authenticator?
We switched to Duo Security for identity verification. We’d been using a competitor but got the chance to evaluate Duo for 30 days, and we could not be happier. Duo Security is easy to configure a...
What do you like most about Azure Active Directory?
It is very simple. The Active Directory functions are very easy for us. Its integration with anything is very easy. We can easily do third-party multifactor authentication.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Active Directory?
The cost of Microsoft Entra ID is around $8 per month, which I find very reasonable.
What do you like most about Symantec Siteminder?
It's agent-based. It's convenient to deploy and integrate.
What needs improvement with Symantec Siteminder?
Symantec Siteminder needs to have adaptive authentication and multi-factor authentication as integrated features. Currently, multi-factor authentication is available as a separate solution, and it ...
 

Also Known As

Azure AD, Azure Active Directory, Azure Active Directory, Microsoft Authenticator
SiteMinder, CA SSO, Layer7 SiteMinder
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Entre ID is trusted by companies of all sizes and industries including Walmart, Zscaler, Uniper, Amtrak, monday.com, and more.
British Telecom, CoreBlox, DBS, HMS, Itera ASA and Simeo
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Entra ID vs. Symantec Siteminder and other solutions. Updated: November 2025.
873,085 professionals have used our research since 2012.