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Active Roles by One Identity vs Quest Identity Defense comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 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

Active Roles by One Identity
Ranking in Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM)
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
92
Ranking in other categories
User Provisioning Software (3rd), Active Directory Management (1st)
Quest Identity Defense
Ranking in Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM)
11th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
4.2
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Active Directory Recovery (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM) category, the mindshare of Active Roles by One Identity is 8.3%, up from 4.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Quest Identity Defense is 1.4%. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Active Roles by One Identity8.3%
Quest Identity Defense1.4%
Other90.3%
Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM)
 

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.
SachinSharma4 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Engineer at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Identity monitoring has improved and security teams now detect and investigate threats faster
Quest Identity Defense could be improved by providing more customizable dashboards, more detailed real-time alerts, and better integrations with other security tools such as SIEM and endpoint security solutions. Automated investigations and response workflows could also help reduce manual efforts and speed up threat resolution. Overall, these improvements would make identity threat detection more efficient and easier for security teams to manage. I would to see more advanced automation for threat investigation and response, along with customizable dashboards and more detailed real-time alerts. Better integration with SIEM, endpoint security, and other identity management tools would also be valuable. These improvements could reduce manual investigation efforts, improve threat visibility, and help security teams respond to identity-related threats more efficiently. Additional improvements could include more seamless integration with existing SIEM and security tools, better customization of alerts, and more detailed reporting for Quest Identity Defense. I would also like to see improved visibility into identity-related risks and clearer explanations of AI-generated alerts to help security teams investigate faster. Overall, continued improvements in automation, usability, and reporting would make the solution even more effective for enterprise security teams.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"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."
"The solution improved our organization's security posture by framing the end users and ensuring that capabilities that could cause mistakes are hidden from the web interface."
"One Identity Active Roles has positively impacted our organization by simplifying Active Directory administration and reducing the amount of manual work required for user and access management."
"Having a tool to manage all changes to AD from a single pane of glass is awesome."
"Heavily Automates - it will automate the entire provisioning, re-provisioning, de-provisioning and undo-de-provisioning tasks Complete Audit Trail - it gives an audit trail for each and every activity Increase in accountability – various tasks can be enabled for approval."
"One Identity Active Roles has positively impacted my organization by reducing a lot of manual AD administration work, improving access control, and helping standardize user management processes across the organization."
"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."
"One Identity Active Roles has positively impacted the organization by significantly improving efficiency through automating repetitive tasks and saving time for the IT team."
"For any organization that is looking for a stable and reliable solution for identity management, Quest Identity Defense would be the best tool for them."
"The accuracy and reliability of Quest Identity Defense's AI output have been excellent."
"Quest Identity Defense helped improve our identity security by providing better visibility into user accounts, privileged access, and suspicious authentication activities."
 

Cons

"The way you can search groups could be better."
"Additional documentation about the Angular web interface is needed."
"I am not really satisfied with the customer support for One Identity Active Roles as the support is pretty limited."
"There is room for improvement in One Identity Active Roles. While the product is very capable, managing complex workflows and hybrid environments can sometimes require deeper expertise than expected, so better cloud integration and troubleshooting visibility would also be valuable improvements."
"One Identity Active Roles can be improved by modernizing the UI to be more responsive, as some advanced workflow configurations can feel a bit clunky during setup."
"Integration capabilities are somewhere in the middle; it is not easy to integrate, but it is not the hardest thing out there."
"One Identity Active Roles could be improved with better cloud-native management and SaaS options, simpler reporting, and easier customization."
"One Identity Active Roles could be improved with a more modern and intuitive UI, faster performance for large environments, simpler reporting customization, and smoother integration with cloud-native identity platforms and APIs."
"I did not give it a nine or ten because there is still room for improvements in integration with other security tools, reporting, and ease of configuration."
"I gave it a nine only because there is still room for improvement around usability or customization, making some of the more advanced capabilities easier to use and to understand the tool."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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 is on the higher end."
"It's fairly priced."
"The pricing for Active Roles is expensive but not as expensive as other solutions like Okta."
"It's expensive."
"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."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
26%
Healthcare Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
No data available
 

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 Business1
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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Quest Identity Defense?
Regarding the licensing and setup cost, I was not involved. The implementation team was responsible for that. When we looked at the pricing part, it was reasonable for any enterprise that wants an ...
What needs improvement with Quest Identity Defense?
Quest Identity Defense could be improved by providing more customizable dashboards, more detailed real-time alerts, and better integrations with other security tools such as SIEM and endpoint secur...
What is your primary use case for Quest Identity Defense?
Quest Identity Defense's main use case in our previous organization has been to improve identity security and protect users' accounts. We focused on identifying suspicious identity-related activity...
 

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
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Active Roles by One Identity vs. Quest Identity Defense and other solutions. Updated: October 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.