AWS CloudTrail vs Idira Privileged Access Manager comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Idira by Palo Alto Networks are both solutions in the User Activity Monitoring category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.5, while Idira by Palo Alto Networks is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.6. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 10.7% mindshare in UAM, compared to Idira by Palo Alto Networks’s 11.8% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of Idira by Palo Alto Networks users who would recommend it.

AWS CloudTrail

Read 16 AWS CloudTrail reviews

1,326 Views
1,326 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Idira Privileged Access Man...

Read 230 Idira Privileged Access Manager reviews

20,873 Views
417 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

AWS CloudTrail

Idira Privileged Access Man...

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 2, 2026

Idira Privileged Access Manager and AWS CloudTrail both operate in the realm of security management. Idira offers a more comprehensive suite of privileged session monitoring features, which gives it an edge in feature set.

Features: Idira Privileged Access Manager provides robust monitoring of privileged sessions, session recordings, password management, and integration with platforms such as Unix and databases. It also supports SSH keys and includes real-time monitoring and session termination. AWS CloudTrail excels at logging API calls within AWS environments, integrates with AWS applications like Lambda and Amazon S3, and enhances security audits and troubleshooting capabilities.

Room for Improvement: Idira Privileged Access Manager requires an improved user interface for broader platform compatibility, better integration of SAML, and a streamlined user experience. AWS CloudTrail would benefit from support for non-API activities, quicker event capture, and more comprehensive filtering options across various parameters.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Idira Privileged Access Manager is predominantly deployed on-premises and in hybrid cloud environments, involving a more complex setup process, with variable customer support experiences. AWS CloudTrail is easier to deploy as a cloud-native service within AWS environments, receiving positive feedback for its timely and effective customer support.

Pricing and ROI: Idira Privileged Access Manager has a higher price point, which may be prohibitive for smaller organizations despite its extensive features. It often requires significant investment but delivers ROI through enhanced security and compliance. AWS CloudTrail is more affordable, often seen as low-cost due to its integration with existing AWS subscriptions, with additional value through customizable log storage options via S3 at minimal expense.

To learn more, read our detailed AWS CloudTrail vs. Idira Privileged Access Manager Report (Updated: April 2026).

Buyer's Guide

AWS CloudTrail vs. Idira Privileged Access Manager

April 2026

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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

AWS CloudTrail

Ranking in User Activity Monitoring

2nd

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Idira Privileged Access Man...

Ranking in User Activity Monitoring

1st

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

230

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise Password Managers (3rd), Privileged Access Management (PAM) (1st), Mainframe Security (1st), Operational Technology (OT) Security (3rd)

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the User Activity Monitoring category, the mindshare of AWS CloudTrail is 10.7%, up from 8.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Idira Privileged Access Manager is 11.8%, down from 16.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

User Activity Monitoring Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
CyberArk Privileged Access Manager	11.8%
AWS CloudTrail	10.7%
Other	77.5%

User Activity Monitoring

Featured Reviews

ChinnajeeRao

Principal Technical Architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees

Comprehensive log management streamlines workflow and enhances monitoring capabilities

For monitoring, we use Dynatrace. Dynatrace is connected with AWS CloudTrail, so AWS CloudTrail sends the notifications via SNS to Dynatrace. We get notifications, and Dynatrace will send notifications. AWS CloudTrail is a log function that will store all logs easily for whatever services we are using on Amazon. All logs will be stored in AWS CloudTrail for 15 years, as we have the service purchased for that duration. The logs will be stored in AWS CloudTrail via S3 bucket. In AWS CloudTrail, we have enabled CPU, disk, and RAM monitoring. These are three services we are monitoring from AWS CloudTrail. AWS CloudTrail will monitor and produce graphs. We have separate L1 teams for monitoring; they will monitor and share the information. Also, Dynatrace will receive the information, and if any service goes beyond the threshold limit, AWS CloudTrail will create an alert. CloudTrail and CloudWatch are sister services. Both should be preconfigured internally. We only watch the dashboards because we can't go and watch each service; there are multiple servers running and multiple services configured, so we watch only the dashboard graphs. If any graph goes beyond the normal limit, we take action. We watch the graph. If any of the graphs show abnormal activity, then immediately we dig into AWS CloudWatch and AWS CloudTrail. We check the reason by verifying the logs. The graph will show you the time period, so we go into AWS CloudWatch, filter the logs for that particular time period, and from there, we identify the cause of the issue, and then we troubleshoot. API is a main element that allows us to connect AWS CloudWatch to AWS CloudTrail and AWS CloudTrail to Dynatrace. That connection is done via API. By API, everything is integrated. The integration part is managed by the API, transferring information from one service to another. We are not working on the API; the configuration team, the cloud operations team, they take care of it.

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Atul-Gujar

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.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is a stable solution. AWS handles it well."

"The solution is good as a central logging platform for showing all cloud events."

"One of the most valuable features of AWS CloudTrail is its ability to track and monitor API calls detailedly."

"AWS CloudTrail helps in accelerating incident investigation and response. It increases it because I pull out the logs to CloudTrail, and from CloudTrail watch, I'll send it to the Security Hub and do a visualization with Prometheus and Grafana."

"In one specific scenario, we encountered a situation where a terminated employee still had access to our environment without our knowledge. With AWS CloudTrail, we could track and monitor the employees' activities, revealing that they were downloading specific files from our customer's environment. Without it enabled, we wouldn't have been aware of this."

"What I found most valuable in AWS CloudTrail is that it provides a good context of what's happening in the environment, so it's an excellent way to baseline what's occurring. I also like that AWS CloudTrail helps with audits."

"AWS CloudTrail features a totally cloud-based deployment."

"The management events and CloudTrail Insights are valuable."

More AWS CloudTrail pros

"Since then, CyberArk's Privileged Access Management is still our central solution for the entire estate, including all our servers (Windows/Unix), databases, devices, and so on, with around 5,000 to 8,000 users globally."

"The most important feature is managing the credentials and implementing those policies which rotate the credentials. Session Manager is also key in not letting the users have access to those credentials. Instead, CyberArk actually manages everything by itself."

"It gives us the capability to rotate passwords, which is the biggest thing because we do not want them being stagnant so every service account that we have needs to be rotated at least once a year."

"The vault is almost a set-and-forget solution."

"CyberArk is one of the best PAM solutions and one of the most expensive, but it works better than the others, so the pricing is fair."

"CyberArk Privileged Access Manager has positively impacted my organization, showing significant improvement since all sessions are monitored and isolated using isolated RDP sessions, which are created temporarily and expire if not used."

"Their legacy of more than 20 years is very valuable; it brings a lot of stability to the product and a wide variety of integration with the ecosystem, and because of these factors it has been very successful in deployment, making the PAM platform very stable and strong."

"The interface is very simple to use."

More Idira Privileged Access Manager pros

Cons

"I have not experienced any challenges while using it."

"The platform’s reporting log sheet feature could be more user-friendly."

"Searching the logs is not very easy; it requires a lot of patience and hard work to find the right information in the log."

"AWS CloudTrail does not fit directly into our architecture as it functions more as a helper service, which limited our utilization of its capabilities."

"More controls should be introduced in CloudTrail, especially to see the logs in CloudTrail itself without saving them in S3, as S3 starts to incur charges."

"AWS CloudTrail can sometimes generate too much information, which might lead to a lot of unnecessary data, particularly false positives."

"AWS CloudTrail should be redesigned to capture non-API calls. It would be more effective to have one tool that can perform multiple tasks instead of relying on multiple services for non-API activities."

"AWS CloudTrail only supports AWS, and Azure has its functions, GCP has their own. Dynatrace offers more flexible dashboards and services, making it more adaptable compared to AWS CloudTrail."

More AWS CloudTrail cons

"Performance of PIM could be better and intended for usability as well as security."

"The tool needs to improve its usage and interface. They need to have a modern and useful interface. I want the product to improve its integration capabilities as well since some of the integration features do not work always."

"Areas of CyberArk Privileged Access Manager that can be improved include offering clearer configuration options."

"The major pain point that we have is the capacity of CyberArk due to the sheer volume of NPAs that we are managing."

"It is complicated to deploy for Windows servers compared to other vendors."

"The license is expensive."

"Authentication to the PVWA utilises integration to IIS. Therefore, it is not as strong as desired."

"PAM could be more user-friendly and CyberArk could update the documentation to include more real-world examples. You have to learn it yourself through trial and error. In particular, the online documentation should have more information about troubleshooting."

More Idira Privileged Access Manager cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"CloudTrail itself is free of cost."

"It is a very cheap service because management is a SaaS offering from AWS."

"AWS CloudTrail is a cheap solution."

"The solution is free if you don't need customizations but is not expensive otherwise."

"AWS CloudTrail is free."

"AWS CloudTrail is pretty affordable, and I have to double-check, but the service is free to use. I can add logs on the console, but if I want to store logs long-term, then I have to pay a storage fee, but it's relatively inexpensive."

"The product's licensing is yearly. I would rate the solution's pricing a six out of ten."

"The pricing for CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is quite expensive, and the pricing varies from region to region. In APAC, CyberArk Privileged Access Manager can be obtained for less than in North America, according to my understanding."

"Payments have to be made on a yearly basis toward the licensing costs of the solution."

"This product is very expensive."

"They have two types of licensing: purchase and subscription. You have to pay for each admin user, such as Microsoft admin, mail admin, database admin, etc."

"The product’s pricing is feasible for enterprise customers. The pricing is expensive for smaller businesses. You need to pay additional costs for service implementation and local support."

"Compared to other solutions, it is costly."

"There are additional features added to our CyberArk Privileged Access Manager license. For example, features that allow us to integrate into various kinds of platforms."

More Idira Privileged Access Manager pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

No data available

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	7
Large Enterprise	4

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	59
Midsize Enterprise	42
Large Enterprise	174

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS CloudTrail?

AWS CloudTrail is categorized into management events, data events, and CloudTrail Insights. For one hundred thousand events, management costs are approximately two dollars, data events ten cents, a...

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What needs improvement with AWS CloudTrail?

I do not think there could be improvements in AWS CloudTrail because I am too small to suggest anything. It is already a well-established service from AWS, and I have only been using it for the las...

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What is your primary use case for AWS CloudTrail?

My main use cases for AWS CloudTrail are troubleshooting, monitoring performance, and checking logs. AWS CloudTrail is primarily a log collection service. All AWS logs are sent to AWS CloudTrail, a...

See all answers

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...

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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...

See all answers

What needs improvement with CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?

I believe account discovery and rolling support need to be improved. Account discovery is important when integrating with other systems, as other PAM solutions can perform account discovery and onb...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 37% of the time

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Compared 23% of the time

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Compared 4% of the time

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Compared 3% of the time

Delinea Secret Server vs Idira Privileged Access Manager

Compared 3% of the time

Saviynt Identity Cloud vs Idira Privileged Access Manager

Compared 3% of the time

Keeper Enterprise Password Manager vs Idira Privileged Access Manager

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

AWS CloudTrail

May 2026

Download AWS CloudTrail product report

Buyer's Guide

Idira Privileged Access Manager

May 2026

Download Idira Privileged Access Manager product report

Also Known As

CloudTrail

CyberArk Privileged Access Security, CyberArk Enterprise Password Vault

Overview

AWS CloudTrail offers comprehensive monitoring of AWS environments, enabling detailed tracking and auditing of API calls, changes, and account activities, promoting enhanced security and compliance.

AWS CloudTrail integrates seamlessly with other AWS services to monitor API calls and provide robust logging functionality. It enhances security by logging unauthorized access and scales for comprehensive monitoring across services. CloudTrail also aids compliance by retaining logs, supports troubleshooting with detailed logs, and improves workflow efficiency through integration with tools like Dynatrace. There are opportunities for advancements such as improved filtering, real-time visibility, and better documentation.

What are AWS CloudTrail's important features?

Contextual Activity Tracking: Provides detailed insights into environment activities.
Audit Assistance: Facilitates audits with extensive logs and activity histories.
Change Notifications: Sends notifications for changes in your AWS environment.
Automatic Alerts: Alerts automatically on specific metrics and potential security issues.
Seamless Integration: Integrates with AWS services to enhance monitoring capabilities.
Comprehensive Security: Tracks unauthorized access to enhance security.
Scalable Monitoring: Scales to monitor AWS services comprehensively.
Troubleshooting Support: Detailed logs aid in identifying and solving issues.

What benefits should users look for in reviews?

Enhanced Security: Provides visibility into unauthorized access attempts.
Improved Compliance: Aids in meeting compliance requirements through log retention.
Efficient Integration: Boosts workflow efficiency when integrated with tools like Dynatrace.
Cost-Effective Storage: Facilitates long-term storage by integrating with Amazon S3.
Proactive Monitoring: Enables proactive monitoring and incident investigation.

Organizations across industries leverage AWS CloudTrail for auditing AWS environments, analyzing access and activities for compliance, and accelerating incident investigations. It is employed to monitor API calls, track AWS account operations, and enhance security visibility. Industries use it for proactive monitoring, historical tracking, and streamlining troubleshooting processes. CloudTrail aids in governance and risk management, ensuring transparency in cloud service operations and supporting long-term storage strategies.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

CyberArk Privileged Access Manager safeguards privileged accounts through password management, credential rotation, and session recording. With seamless integration and real-time monitoring, it ensures robust security across platforms.

CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is recognized for its extensive capabilities in managing and securing privileged accounts. It offers vital functionalities such as automatic password rotation, real-time session monitoring, and cross-platform integration through APIs and custom connectors. Users find the flexibility in workflows and granular access controls beneficial, particularly in protecting access across cloud and on-prem infrastructures. However, improvements in its interface, installation process, plugin support, and integration with third-party tools are often suggested. Pricing is a concern for many, along with the need for better dashboard reporting, user provisioning, and enhanced documentation. Organizations leverage this tool for encrypting and monitoring critical account activities and automating password management to bolster security.

What are the key features of CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?

Enterprise Password Vault: Provides secure storage and management of enterprise credentials.
Privilege Session Manager: Offers comprehensive session recording and monitoring.
Privileged Threat Analytics: Detects and alerts on potential credential threats.
Integration Capabilities: Easily integrates with multiple systems using APIs and custom connectors.

What benefits or ROI should users expect?

Enhanced Security: Automates and centralizes password management, reducing risk of account misuse.
Compliance Support: Ensures alignment with compliance policies through automated processes.
Operational Efficiency: Streamlines security operations with real-time monitoring and integration.
Adaptability: Protects privileged access across diverse infrastructure setups including cloud and on-prem.

CyberArk Privileged Access Manager finds substantial use in industries such as finance, healthcare, and technology, where the protection of privileged accounts is critical. These sectors rely on its capabilities to manage application credentials securely and provide safe access for developers, administrators, and vendors across various infrastructures.

Idira by Palo Alto Networks

Sample Customers

HTC, British Gas, Solinor, 2C2P

Rockwell Automation

Buyer's Guide

AWS CloudTrail vs. Idira Privileged Access Manager

April 2026

Free Report: AWS CloudTrail vs. Idira Privileged Access Manager

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