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Cisco Duo vs Secret Double Octopus comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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
161
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (5th), Access Management (5th), ZTNA as a Service (2nd), Cisco Security Portfolio (1st), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) (1st), AI Data Analysis (3rd)
Secret Double Octopus
Ranking in Authentication Systems
36th
Average Rating
7.0
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
Passwordless Authentication (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Authentication Systems category, the mindshare of Cisco Duo is 3.7%, down from 8.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Secret Double Octopus is 0.8%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Authentication Systems Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Duo3.7%
Secret Double Octopus0.8%
Other95.5%
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.
Gaurav Gaurav - PeerSpot reviewer
Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
A solution with good capabilities across a wide range of platforms that comes with a useful mobile application, but upgrades cause issues
We have noticed that patches and upgrades cause issues with how the application functions, due to the lack of stability of the product. However, we would recommend the solution because it has good capabilities, across a wide range of platforms, and the mobile application allows for use via Bluetooth, so users don't have to be connected to the internet. I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The best feature Cisco Duo offers is its simplicity."
"Cisco Duo's visibility into identity-based risks has improved our ability to manage security very well."
"Clients I implemented Cisco Duo at immediately feel more confident in their security environment, and we can see a lot of illegal attempts to get in, giving me faith in the product."
"Cisco Duo has improved my operational efficiency and reduced costs in areas such as authentication, IT support, and security operations significantly."
"The single pane of glass management is very important and it is part of the reason we went with Duo, and anything we can do to save time for our administrators, help desk staff, and engineers, is valuable to us."
"The experience of deploying Cisco Duo is great; it is fast and not too complex in my opinion, as you can integrate basically anything into Duo, so I would say the experience is overall very great as an administrator."
"It is very easy. Having just wrapped up my tenure at Cisco, it was used day in and day out for security. It was always easy to log in and not have to worry about logging in multiple times."
"It is very easy for users to enroll, and there are a lot of insights that we get from using the app on devices that people use to authenticate."
"This solution has a mobile application, which comes with multi-factor authentication; allowing for more flexible usage, without having to sacrifice system security."
 

Cons

"I think that the dashboard needs to be improved."
"Cisco Duo is a fully cloud-based solution. It would be beneficial if Cisco provided a fully on-premise solution."
"I would like to see some features simplified, such as securing, configuring, and implementing Microsoft Remote Desktop. Other than that, the solution was rock solid throughout my time administering it."
"We had a lot of trouble configuring the password reset function, and as a result we now have a second channel that bypasses Duo to allow users to reset their password."
"There are limitations because Cisco Duo does not support Hotmail accounts, which many people use to log in to their systems."
"We first deployed Duo Security for our company with the VPN, and afterward, about a year later, we implemented it for a customer of ours where we offered infrastructure as a service. When I tried to establish a VPN connection through Duo Security, it did not function well on that version, which was the latest one at the time. So, I had to make a copy of the machine and then implement Duo Security with the VPN because it did not function well with the newer version."
"Its documentation must be in French because we are a French-speaking country. They should also provide more training documentation. Its management interface should also be improved. They should also improve its update period. If I compare its update period with other products such as Palo Alto firewalls, this solution is really slow in updates."
"Cisco Duo is definitely not doing things that others are not doing, so there is no unique selling proposition."
"The product suffers from frequent disturbances in service, that have impacted our end users when we deploy software updates."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I am not aware of the pricing. There are two departments, and I don't have any information about them."
"Cisco has the most expensive products because market leaders tend to charge a lot."
"I believe the licensing model is excellent as it offers flexibility to our customers, allowing them to adopt a crawl, walk, or run approach."
"The pricing was a lot more than what we were paying for our previous solution."
"Its price is reasonable. It is not highly expensive."
"You pay per user when using this solution and the pricing is fair."
"From a business perspective, it is a little bit costly. The licensing is on a per-user basis."
"It has a fair pricing model. I know they have different tiers, but it would be nice to have different types of licenses for certain groups of users in our organization. That way, we wouldn't have to lump everybody into one group. That would be also one complaint."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Educational Organization
10%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business64
Midsize Enterprise28
Large Enterprise79
No data available
 

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?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Cisco Duo indicates that the main setup cost for us has been the time and effort required to integrate Duo with existing applications, auth...
What needs improvement with Duo Security?
Cisco Duo is generally easy to use, but there are a few areas where it could be improved. The initial setup and configuration can require some technical knowledge, especially when integrating Duo w...
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Also Known As

Duo Security
Octopus Authenticator
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
United Technologies (UTC), American Family Association, ASL Airlines France, BNP Paribas, A Fortune 50 Bank, Bingham County Idaho, Britannia Financial Services, Carolina Behavioral Health Alliance LLC, European Commission, County of Midland Michigan, JRM Construction Management, Greer Commission of Public Works, Poste Italiane, Kennedy Wilson Europe, Key Mechanical, Marker Therapeutics Inc, Mediawan, Ministero Dell'interno, FairPrice, NTUC Health, Mercatus, TBC, Techni-Photo, Tinsa Group, Yates Law, Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, Z-Medica Corporation, A Member of the 5 largest US law firms.
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Cisco, Okta and others in Authentication Systems. Updated: September 2026.
916,771 professionals have used our research since 2012.