No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Cisco Duo vs Defender by One Identity comparison

Why PeerSpot?
 

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

Cisco Duo
Ranking in Authentication Systems
2nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
160
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (4th), Access Management (5th), ZTNA as a Service (2nd), Cisco Security Portfolio (1st), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) (1st), AI Data Analysis (3rd)
Defender by One Identity
Ranking in Authentication Systems
13th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Authentication Systems category, the mindshare of Cisco Duo is 3.7%, down from 8.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Defender by One Identity is 1.6%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Authentication Systems Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Duo3.7%
Defender by One Identity1.6%
Other94.7%
Authentication Systems
 

Featured Reviews

Charles Slaustas - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Technology Contractor at Insight global
Supports seamless authentication for users across multiple organizations and personal portals
The features I use in Cisco Duo include Duo Pushes to confirm my identity to the device, and eventually as MFA security was increased, I actually had to use exchange passcodes. Sometimes, I have to go into the site and get into Cisco Duo to retrieve the passcode, and many of them have been two-factor, where the sites send a passcode that I have to enter into Cisco Duo. It has been more of the latter. I have not seen issues with lagging or crashing on Cisco Duo's end; it was usually on the client end, often because someone set up a bad upgrade or there were connection issues with the Cisco Duo cloud through the administrative site.
Mahesh Malve - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Business Development Associate at DigitalTrack Solutions ind pvt ltd
Advanced analytics have strengthened privileged access security and reduced incident response time
While One Identity Defender is a strong solution overall, there are a few areas where I feel it could be improved. One area is the user interface and dashboard customization. Although it is functional, making it more modern and allowing deeper customization would improve the user experience, especially for quick monitoring. Another improvement could be in reporting flexibility. While it provides good reports, having more custom report building options and easier export features would be helpful for different compliance and manageability needs. From an integration perspective, while One Identity Defender works well with core systems, having more out-of-the-box integrations with modern cloud services and SaaS platforms would reduce the need for custom configuration. In terms of support, the overall support is good, but faster response times for critical issues and more detailed troubleshooting documentation would help teams resolve problems more efficiently.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Regarding stability and reliability of Cisco Duo, I would say it is 99.9% reliable and stable."
"For me, the biggest return on investment when using Cisco Duo is my time."
"As a former employee, I think it's top-notch when it comes to protecting internal and external threats and preventing unauthorized access to the network."
"Duo Security just adds another layer; it's a great addition to the security of any network infrastructure."
"Cisco Duo scales with the growing needs of our organization by making it easy to acquire more licensing, especially with an enterprise agreement, which allows built-in growth and minimizes worries about licensing as we expand."
"I love Duo Security's push notifications. It's simple, fast, and secure. From the user's perspective, the solution is seamless. The security aspect is great."
"The feature of Cisco Duo that I prefer the most is the policies, being able to control what we need to within the policies. You can get pretty granular."
"Multifactor authentication and secure two-factor authentication are the most valuable features. It's been around for a while, but now it's becoming an enforced behavior as opposed to something that you used to do as optional."
"It's very fast, and it's easy to use because it's integrated with Active Directory."
"One Identity Defender has positively impacted our organization by improving overall security through the addition of MFA, which reduces the risk of unauthorized access and makes user authentication more controlled and reliable."
"One Identity Defender has good network protection."
"If you decide to activate this solution, your infrastructure will be centered around flexibility."
"We have definitely seen a positive ROI from using One Identity Defender, as our security team now spends about twenty to thirty percent less time on manual log analytics and investigations because the system automatically highlights high-risk activities, and we did not need to increase team size despite growing infrastructure as the tool helps us handle more security events with the same team."
"We find that the product scales very well."
 

Cons

"An AI support robot or bot that provides direct answers to questions without requiring the search for facts or documents to find solutions would be an improvement."
"If you want easier management, Duo wouldn't meet that need."
"For the back-end, there could be a few more security features applied."
"On a scale from one being the worst to ten being the best, I would rate my customer service and technical support experience as a seven."
"Cisco Duo is stable, but occasionally there are emails about incidents that affect some services temporarily."
"Conversational AI in Cisco Duo is limited in its current application."
"At the moment, I believe that more integration between Cisco Duo Identity Intelligence and the classic Cisco Duo console can be improved, since it is still a separate platform, and when I click on Identity Intelligence, I have to open a new window and log in again."
"We have had instances where Duo Security stops working on a user's device, which we have fixed by uninstalling and then reinstalling it."
"The only reason it is not a ten is because response time can sometimes be slower for complex or escalated cases."
"Maybe it could provide support for more web applications. It seems more focused on IIS web applications."
"The login capabilities could be better."
"We have some clients that are wanting to protect their Apache web servers with One Identity Defender but all the research I have done says cannot be done. It can only be oriented to an IIS server. One Identity Defender should have more integration with more types of web servers."
"One Identity Defender is a strong product, but there are a few areas where it can be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"From a business perspective, it is a little bit costly. The licensing is on a per-user basis."
"It is affordable for what's coming to the table with it, but in this day and age, the cost is looked at under a microscope, and companies need to very finely define what is needed versus what is critical. In some cases, it might not be cost-effective for a company to have it. In a lot of other cases, it is the cost of doing business."
"The pricing was a lot more than what we were paying for our previous solution."
"Its price is reasonable. It is not highly expensive."
"My experience with pricing, setup costs, and licensing has been good, with no issues. I am pleased that the prices remained stable after Cisco acquired the solution."
"The cost was reasonable. Licensing was pretty straightforward for a change."
"Our licensing fee is currently on an annual basis."
"I only need the solution for IT staff, which makes it relatively cheap. If I deployed it for the whole company, it would be costly, so it depends on the number of users. Duo Security is affordable compared to other products in the segment."
Information not available
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Authentication Systems solutions are best for your needs.
913,076 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Outsourcing Company
22%
Construction Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business64
Midsize Enterprise26
Large Enterprise80
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise1
 

Questions from the Community

How does Duo Security compare with Microsoft Authenticator?
We switched to Duo Security for identity verification. We’d been using a competitor but got the chance to evaluate Duo for 30 days, and we could not be happier. Duo Security is easy to configure a...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Duo Security?
Regarding Cisco Duo's affordability for the Ukrainian market, I think it is affordable. It depends on an installation base. For a medium and mid-range market, I think it is a fully affordable price...
What needs improvement with Duo Security?
Cisco Duo is a fully cloud-based solution. It would be beneficial if Cisco provided a fully on-premise solution. I have discussed this with the local Cisco office in Kyiv regarding any possibility ...
What needs improvement with One Identity Defender?
One Identity Defender is a strong product, but there are a few areas where it can be improved. First, the user interface and reporting dashboards could be made more intuitive and customizable for f...
What is your primary use case for One Identity Defender?
One Identity Defender strengthens identity and access security through MFA, helping us ensure that only authorized users can access critical systems, especially for privileged accounts, with a focu...
What advice do you have for others considering One Identity Defender?
My advice for others looking into using One Identity Defender would be first to clearly define your use case, especially whether you need MFA mainly for privileged access, remote users, or both, as...
 

Also Known As

Duo Security
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Bakersfield Police Department, Village of Westmont, Illinois
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Duo vs. Defender by One Identity and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
913,076 professionals have used our research since 2012.