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Active Roles by One Identity vs Change Auditor for Active Directory comparison

 

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 Active Directory Management
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
90
Ranking in other categories
User Provisioning Software (3rd), Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM) (1st)
Change Auditor for Active D...
Ranking in Active Directory Management
7th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the Active Directory Management category, the mindshare of Active Roles by One Identity is 12.3%, up from 6.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Change Auditor for Active Directory is 5.5%, down from 7.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Active Directory Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
One Identity Active Roles12.3%
Change Auditor for Active Directory5.5%
Other82.2%
Active Directory Management
 

Featured Reviews

Varun Mehra - PeerSpot reviewer
collaboration support engineer at a retailer with 11-50 employees
Automation has transformed onboarding and access control and now streamlines daily governance
While One Identity Active Roles is a strong identity and access management solution overall, there are a few areas where it could improve. One challenge we experienced was the initial setup and configuration complexity. Deploying workflows, policies, and delegation models require careful planning and a good understanding of the Active Directory environment. For organizations without experienced administrators, the learning curve can feel quite steep in the beginning. The user interface could also be more modern and intuitive. Some administrative tasks require navigating through multiple menus and the overall experience could be simplified for faster day-to-day management. Another area for improvement is reporting and customization. While the auditing features are good, creating highly customized reports sometimes requires additional efforts or scripting knowledge. More built-in reporting templates and easier dashboard customization would be helpful. We have also noticed that troubleshooting workflows or synchronization issues can occasionally take time because the logs can be very detailed and technical. Better diagnostic tools and simpler error explanations would improve the operational experience. That said, once the platform is properly configured and maintained, it performs reliably and delivers strong automation, delegation, and governance capabilities. One additional area where One Identity Active Roles could improve is cloud integration and hybrid environment management. While it works well with Active Directory and the Microsoft environment, organizations moving heavily towards cloud-first infrastructure may want even deeper and more seamless integration with modern SaaS platforms and identity providers. Performance optimization in large environments could be improved. In very large enterprise deployments with complex workflows and multiple managed domains, some administrative actions and synchronization tasks can occasionally feel slower than expected. Another point is documentation and onboarding resources. The product is feature-rich, but some advanced configurations require going through extensive documentation. More practical examples, guided setup wizards, and easier to follow best practice guides would help new administrators adopt the platform faster. Overall, the core functionality is solid, and most of the pain points are related more to usability, complexity, and modernization rather than the reliability. One additional improvement I would mention is around integration flexibility with third-party ITSM and DevOps tools. While the platform integrates well within Microsoft-centric environments, broader out-of-the-box integration and simpler API workflows for non-Microsoft ecosystems would make deployment and automation easier for organizations using diverse infrastructure. Another area is upgrade and migration simplicity. In enterprise environments, version upgrades and environment migration sometimes require careful planning and testing. Streamlining that process with more automated compatibility checks and migration assistance would reduce operational overhead.
reviewer2794194 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr Mgr Cyber Defense at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Auditing changes has become faster and now uncovers misconfigurations within minutes
The best features Change Auditor for Active Directory offers are that it's lightweight and easy to understand. You don't have to memorize event IDs since it's in English. What makes Change Auditor for Active Directory lightweight and easy to understand in my experience is that it doesn't require the events to record to the domain controllers. Therefore, I can focus just on the event types without having to turn up detailed logging on my DCs. Change Auditor for Active Directory has positively impacted my organization by helping us respond to audits very quickly to show that we had evidence of who was making the changes and match them up to the ticket request and who approved it. After implementing Change Auditor for Active Directory, it has allowed us to answer questions literally in minutes, whereas it would have taken us half a day to a day before.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Overall, it has made our identity administration process more structured, predictable, and easier to manage as our environment has grown."
"The auto-provisioning or role-based permission handling makes my daily work easier and more efficient because it automates our environment since we don't have to manually onboard or deboard employees."
"Active Roles helped increase operational efficiency in our organization."
"One Identity Active Roles has significantly reduced both the complexity and workload of administrative tasks related to Active Directory; many repetitive tasks are automated, so admins spend much less time on routine activities."
"Automated provisioning and access management reduced manual administrative effort by nearly 50 to 60%, which saved significant onboarding time and lowered the number of access-related errors and support tickets."
"There are a lot of other benefits that we take advantage of that are above and beyond the native Active Directory functions that Microsoft provides."
"One Identity Active Roles has positively impacted our organization by improving operational efficiency, strengthening governance, and reducing manual administrative effort within Active Directory and identity management operations."
"One Identity Active Roles has impacted my organization by simplifying centralized Active Directory management and improving efficiency for user provisioning, access management, and routine administrative tasks."
"Change Auditor for Active Directory has positively impacted my organization by helping us respond to audits very quickly to show that we had evidence of who was making the changes and match them up to the ticket request and who approved it."
"The most valuable features are the ability to protect Active Directory accounts and groups, and the real-time notifications that help manage Active Directory more effectively."
 

Cons

"First is the user interface and experience. While it is functional, it can feel complex for a new user and less intuitive, especially for onboarding a new user."
"One Identity Active Roles could be improved with a more modern and intuitive user interface, faster performance during large-scale directory operations, and simpler initial deployment and configuration."
"The initial setup of One Identity Active Roles can be more simplified."
"For ActiveRoles, it would be good if the product supports multi-scripting language. You can use only VBScript."
"The user and group management in Azure AD could be better. Our focus these days is dynamic sharing with several on-prem Microsoft applications like SharePoint."
"Overall, One Identity Active Roles is a very powerful tool, but there are definitely areas where it can be improved."
"One Identity Active Roles does not require many improvements, but for upcoming or new users, there should be an easier initial setup and configuration."
"Even though I advocate for One Identity Active Roles, there are areas for improvement, particularly in hybrid integration experiences where it feels a bit clunky compared to its capabilities for on-premises AD management."
"Change Auditor for Active Directory could be improved if the client were more flexible when installed, so if I upgrade the server, I wouldn't have to replace the clients at the same time."
"Areas that could be improved include having more management capabilities with command-line scripts and more flexibility in general."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's fairly priced."
"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 pricing is on the higher end."
"The price is reasonable. It costs us about 1 million Danish kroner annually, and we also spend about half as much on consultants."
"The licensing model is a simple user-based model, not that much complicated."
"The pricing for Active Roles is expensive but not as expensive as other solutions like Okta."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
24%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Insurance Company
9%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business97
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise45
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for One Identity Active Roles?
I wasn't directly involved in the pricing or licensing decisions, so I cannot comment on the exact cost. For our operations, I believe the investment was considered worthwhile because the product r...
What needs improvement with One Identity Active Roles?
I think One Identity Active Roles is a mature and reliable solution, but there are a few areas where it could be improved. The biggest one is the management interface, which feels dated compared to...
What is your primary use case for One Identity Active Roles?
Our main use case for One Identity Active Roles is to simplify and standardize Active Directory administration across multiple business units while reducing the amount of manual work handled by our...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Quest Change Auditor for Active Directory?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing was pretty straightforward. Actually, we bundled it with some other services offered from Quest to get a volume discount.
What needs improvement with Quest Change Auditor for Active Directory?
Change Auditor for Active Directory could be improved if the client were more flexible when installed, so if I upgrade the server, I wouldn't have to replace the clients at the same time. I think g...
What is your primary use case for Quest Change Auditor for Active Directory?
My main use case for Change Auditor for Active Directory is auditing changes, finding changes to undo, and break-fix solving issues. For example, I could give you a quick specific example of how I'...
 

Also Known As

Quest Active Roles
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

City of Frankfurt, Moore Public Schools, George Washington University, Transavia Airlines, Howard County, MD. See all stories at OneIdentity.com/casestudies
American Airlines, Bank of America, BARCLAYS, ebay, Ford, intel, MARS, MERCK, Microsoft, UBER, VISA
Find out what your peers are saying about Active Roles by One Identity vs. Change Auditor for Active Directory and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
906,852 professionals have used our research since 2012.