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Certificate Lifecycle Manager vs Symantec VIP Access Manager comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 2, 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

Certificate Lifecycle Manager
Ranking in Authentication Systems
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
Certificate Management Software (2nd)
Symantec VIP Access Manager
Ranking in Authentication Systems
12th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Access Management (22nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Authentication Systems category, the mindshare of Certificate Lifecycle Manager is 1.9%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec VIP Access Manager is 2.0%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Authentication Systems Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Certificate Lifecycle Manager1.9%
Symantec VIP Access Manager2.0%
Other96.1%
Authentication Systems
 

Featured Reviews

Deb Malya - PeerSpot reviewer
Section Head Cybersecurity at a energy/utilities company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Strong privileged access controls have protected critical sessions and improved credential oversight
The best features of CyberArk Certificate Manager include its robust privileged access management capability, session monitoring, and strong defense against threat vectors. PSM, PIM, and application legacy connectivity for CyberArk Certificate Manager are probably the best in the market. The real-time threat intelligence feature helps with preventing security breaches as it never allows any privileged access to get into the application until you check out the user ID and password, effectively managing credentials. It also includes MFA and session monitoring, tracking who is checking out the password and credentials, which are capabilities that cannot be bypassed, thus neutralizing threat protection. I use features like PSM, PIM, session monitoring, and everything else with CyberArk Certificate Manager.
Berk Onur - PeerSpot reviewer
Presales Consultant at Cyberwise
With its mobile application, this tool offers a convenient and user-friendly experience to its users
To improve the tool, I think that the solution should consider integrations with other cybersecurity and IT technologies, such as Privileged Access Management and Site Integration. Additionally, the implementation of second-factor authentication via Symantec VIP Access Manager, CyberArk, and Delinea, among other technologies, could be best for the product. While the existing technology is okay, improving the integration capabilities for Symantec VIP Access Manager would benefit the product. I would like to see the solution meet the integration needs at our company. While many cybersecurity solutions can function independently, they often lack integration with our systems due to missed integration points. Improving the solution's integration feature would be beneficial.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We have reduced 80% to 90% of our outages with Venafi, which impacts the revenue substantially."
"Since using CyberArk Certificate Manager, it saves a lot of time, reduces errors, and makes compliance much easier."
"CyberArk Certificate Manager has positively impacted my organization by automating the credential process, allowing users to rotate and share passwords with no human intervention required."
"The most valuable feature of Venafi is the automation that helps save time and reduce human error."
"CyberArk Certificate Manager is doing its best with multiple layers of security, and while they face challenges with legacy applications, they can still connect to web applications, rich applications, desktop applications, and cloud-native applications."
"The feature that I have found most valuable is their certificate discovery."
"CyberArk Certificate Manager has impacted our organization positively by making our life much easier by automatically updating and deploying certificates so our sites load correctly and we save a lot of time."
"By using Certificate Manager, we have reduced our potential risk significantly due to certificate expiry, as all teams are getting emails before 60 days and 90 days, which is helpful."
"Other than it provides us with remote access, so it's fairly easy to install, fairly easy to set up, and provides us the ability to get into our corporate environment."
"Cloud-based service and management."
"Pricing was about 25% of the old solution, saving us about $500,000 over three years for 10,000 users."
"The VPN we are using is good and working quite well."
"The main benefit of Symantec VIP is that it provides strong authentication while keeping it as a very user friendly experience."
"The product is useful for providing user access from an in-built office server as we follow the work-from-home model."
"It offers more platform support, like Apple, Android, and Microsoft."
"The solution has helped to increase staff productivity by approximately a minute."
 

Cons

"Regarding needed improvements, the UI needs enhancement. Sometimes it experiences latency-wise issues."
"I would like to see included in the next release of Venafi integration with the cloud HSM's, Hardware Security Module. Additionally, I would say other cloud services, because it's not only cloud that's essential. If you have a customer that has a lot of their IT moved into cloud, integration with different cloud services is always an area to improve."
"The support from Certificate Manager needs improvement based on my experience. The response time needs improvement, and it takes too long to resolve or provide solutions for some tickets."
"Unfortunately, we didn’t receive a notification from Venafi because it wasn't configured correctly, which led to a loss of around 12 million dollars."
"In terms of areas for improvement, one thing that we did not appreciate about Certificate Manager was having agents on everything."
"The on-prem version is far more mature than the cloud version, which lacks a lot of features that the on-prem version offers, at least when we did the POC and evaluated the product."
"For the stability of the solution itself, I would rate it a seven."
"The product was really good when it was a Venafi product. However, since its acquisition by CyberArk, there has been a lack of significant innovations. They are pushing for cloud adoption, but we prefer on-premises solutions due to regulatory concerns."
"It is challenging to use when installing a new version."
"The reporting on the VIP Manager is not correct."
"At times, the relay server could not contact Symantec; it would fail open and allow access without a passcode."
"If they had dashboards or a report for managers or executives, then it would allow them to see the status and have it make sense to them."
"It gets out of sync with Active Directory or whatever it might be, whatever the authentication piece is on Active Directory, and they just reset it on the backend. I never have to contact the vendor."
"Geofencing needs improvement."
"Technical support is one of the worst problems."
"Maybe Symantec could consider providing a step-by-step guide for first-time users."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing model is complex, considering factors beyond the number of certificates. This complexity can make our payments to Venafi challenging if costs continue to rise. It is good but more expensive than the competitors."
"Venafi's pricing appears to be competitive within the market."
"There are additional costs for maintenance."
"I can say that the solution is worth the money."
"There is a one-time setup fee plus the licenses are provided as per the number of users. For SMS and voice calls, the costs are separate."
"Licensing and pricing seems very fair."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Construction Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Construction Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Outsourcing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Large Enterprise19
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise10
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Venafi?
In terms of pricing, they are a little costly, but they are the best in the market today, so I would say they are worth every penny, rating them again at seven or eight.
What needs improvement with Venafi?
CyberArk Certificate Manager can be improved, particularly in terms of integrations with other tools. I would like to see improvements in integrations with ID, Kerberos, or with other companies for...
What advice do you have for others considering Venafi?
Since using CyberArk Certificate Manager, I have seen specific outcomes such as a reduction in incidents because I can work with CyberArk Certificate Manager, where digital certificates are everywh...
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Also Known As

Venafi
Symantec VIP
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Surescripts, CME Group, TD Bank Group, Aetna, MoneyGram, Zions Bancorp, Cisco
Maine Medical Center, Aria S.p.A
Find out what your peers are saying about Certificate Lifecycle Manager vs. Symantec VIP Access Manager and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
911,493 professionals have used our research since 2012.