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Active Roles by One Identity vs OpenText Identity Manager comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 20, 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

Active Roles by One Identity
Ranking in User Provisioning Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
92
Ranking in other categories
Active Directory Management (1st), Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM) (1st)
OpenText Identity Manager
Ranking in User Provisioning Software
12th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Identity Management (IM) (25th), Identity Governance Administration (IGA) (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the User Provisioning Software category, the mindshare of Active Roles by One Identity is 4.8%, down from 7.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenText Identity Manager is 3.4%, down from 3.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
User Provisioning Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Active Roles by One Identity4.8%
OpenText Identity Manager3.4%
Other91.8%
User Provisioning Software
 

Featured Reviews

Puru Solanki ( ITIL. CISM , CCSP ) - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Head at Citadel Global
Automation has streamlined onboarding and governance and delivers faster, more secure access
Overall, we are very satisfied with Active Roles by One Identity, but there are a few areas that could be improved. The user interface could be more modern and intuitive, especially for new administrators. Some advanced configuration and policy settings have a steep learning curve and could be simplified. We would also like to see more built-in integrations with cloud platforms and SaaS applications, along with additional out-of-the-box reporting templates. These improvements would make the product even easier and more flexible for organizations managing hybrid environments. One thing that would make our daily work even smoother is having more ready-to-use templates for common administrative tasks and reports. This would reduce the need for customization and help teams get up and running more quickly. Additionally, faster and simpler synchronization for hybrid and cloud environments would be beneficial, especially for organizations managing both on-premises and cloud identities. More detailed documentation and guided setup for advanced features would help new administrators learn the platform faster and more easily. One additional improvement I would like to see for Active Roles by One Identity is a better built-in dashboard with more real-time insights into identity and access activities. It would be helpful if upgrades and migrations were simpler and required less planning. Finally, expanding native integrations with more cloud services and third-party applications would make the platform even more versatile and reliable. These enhancements would improve the overall user experience while keeping the product's strong security and automation capabilities.
GA
IDM Consultant at GCA Consultoria de Informática Ltda
Highly flexible with many connectors, offers excellent scalability
The initial deployment of the environment typically takes about a day to a day and a half to install and configure all the servers. Integrating applications can vary, with easy and well-documented integrations taking around 40 hours, while more complex ones may take up to 80 hours or more. However, integration with applications can vary in complexity, depending on their documentation and APIs. We prioritize integrations based on customer needs, starting with HR systems and adapting to their specific requirements for user configuration. Typically, a deployment team consists of up to four people, depending on project size, with expertise in operating systems and integration. For ongoing management and maintenance, at most two people are required to monitor servers, and integrations, and address any issues that arise.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"ARS probably saves us at least two weeks out of every month."
"Active Roles is a thousand times better than native Microsoft tools."
"Having a tool to manage all changes to AD from a single pane of glass is awesome."
"One Identity Active Roles has positively impacted my organization by speeding up the user provisioning, reducing manual AD tickets, strengthening the security through consistent access control, and improving compliance."
"One Identity Active Roles has a positive impact on our organization by improving the efficiency and consistency of our Active Directory operations."
"One Identity Active Roles has positively impacted my organization by enabling faster onboarding and offboarding through automations, reducing manual AD errors and permission mistakes, and lightening the workload for the infrastructure help desk team."
"Active Roles is easy to configure. It isn't a plug-and-play solution, and you need expertise to set it up. However, once you have your templates, it's easy to deploy in a highly decentralized environment. The custom configuration for our customers is fantastic, especially the web interface."
"I saw a strong ROI with One Identity Active Roles through around a forty to fifty percent reduction in service desk workload, faster user provisioning from hours to minutes, fewer manual errors, and improved compliance and audit efficiency, which saves significant administrative time and operational efforts."
"The most valuable feature of this solution has been the ability for us to integrate a lot of external systems, and the automatic transfer of a lot of identity information. Additionally, the customization is very good."
"The most valuable features of NetIQ Identity Manager are the synchronization of different directories, such as Active Directory. We have many Active Directory systems, not only one."
"I like the eDirectory feature."
"The Identity Engine is event-based and provides real-time synchronization and password synchronization to more than 40 different applications and services."
"The product is easy to use."
"The access request management has improved significantly in terms of its user interface. What sets it apart from competitors like SailPoint is that it's an event-based solution rather than schedule-based. That's a key differentiator."
"Identity and access management processes have developed to become automatic and fast."
"NetIQ does not have a limit on the number of users."
 

Cons

"I have not seen a return on investment or any relevant metrics and I cannot imagine we would have saved any employees or any full-time equivalents for One Identity Active Roles."
"There are some features that we think should be included in their next release. We think these things would take them to the next level: the ability to completely force or limit any dynamic group processing to specific servers, change-tracking reporting of virtual attributes, and the ability to use files as inputs to automation workloads. These things have also been talked about. Knowing them, they're probably working on them."
"One area for improvement in Active Roles by One Identity would be enhanced support for administrators, especially when dealing with complex policies, delegated rules, and users."
"Many users feel the user interface is not very modern or intuitive, and it can take time to get used to navigating the console and workflows."
"One Identity Active Roles is a mature and reliable product, but there are definitely areas where it could be improved."
"One Identity Active Roles is very helpful, but a few improvements could make it even better, such as simplifying the user interface to make it more user-friendly, especially for new users, and making setup and configuration easier."
"Pricing for One Identity Active Roles is a bit on the higher side compared to other options in the market."
"Web console – it should have more customization options in terms of look and feel of the landing page."
"NetIQ Identity Manager can improve the bulk account uploads, it's very slow. We work in the education sector, and every year we have approximately 20,000 accounts to create in a very short period, the NetIQ Identity Manager has a problem with this, we need to use a batch job."
"The interface is old and outdated, and the design software seems archaic."
"If it works, Designer is a charm, but it can be a pain to keep updated because of all the Java stuff that regularly goes wrong."
"Technical support is average. When it's come to complex issues, it takes longer than expected to solve."
"There's no huge thing missing, because it's already comprehensive. Now and then, however, there might be a minor issue."
"The user facing interfaces are not too friendly and they are also fairly hard to configure."
"Technical support is very good, but in my country the ecosystem of consultants is scarce."
"There are some limitations in the custom workflows, mainly in the GUI presentation, but the latest release improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's fairly priced."
"The licensing model is a simple user-based model, not that much complicated."
"The pricing is on the higher end."
"The pricing is high. I have not been involved with the renewal or cost aspect, but I know it is not cheap by any means. However, it is very useful for our environment."
"It's expensive."
"The price is reasonable. It costs us about 1 million Danish kroner annually, and we also spend about half as much on consultants."
"The pricing for Active Roles is expensive but not as expensive as other solutions like Okta."
"The solution is quite affordable."
"Micro Focus is flexible when it comes to price. The cost varies from customer to customer. There are no additional costs, though. Everything is included."
"The price of the solution is a bit high and could be reduced."
"I would rate the pricing a two out of ten, with one being low price and ten being high price. It is significantly more cost-effective than the major players in the market."
"It would easily help them in getting more market and more customers if more consultants knew about their software. If they could keep it free for schools for teaching purposes, it would be good. I had to pay myself to get it and use it for training. Their competitors are giving it for free. I had to pay for it myself. They are losing market to their competitors."
"You just need to be aware that the more systems you connect, the more license fees you have to pay."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
26%
Healthcare Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business99
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise46
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise6
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with One Identity Active Roles?
To improve Active Roles by One Identity, I would like to see more automation around role assignment and access reviews, along with better reporting and an easier-to-use dashboard. While the integra...
What is your primary use case for One Identity Active Roles?
My main use case for Active Roles by One Identity involves managing user access and roles across different applications while ensuring users have the right permissions based on their responsibiliti...
Ask a question
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Also Known As

Quest Active Roles
Novell Identity Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

City of Frankfurt, Moore Public Schools, George Washington University, Transavia Airlines, Howard County, MD. See all stories at OneIdentity.com/casestudies
Sheetz
Find out what your peers are saying about Active Roles by One Identity vs. OpenText Identity Manager and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
921,714 professionals have used our research since 2012.