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Cisco Duo vs Thales SafeNet Trusted Access comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 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

Cisco Duo
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
4th
Ranking in Access Management
5th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
120
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (2nd), ZTNA as a Service (3rd), Cisco Security Portfolio (1st), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) (1st)
Thales SafeNet Trusted Access
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
19th
Ranking in Access Management
24th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (24th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of Cisco Duo is 3.2%, down from 6.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Thales SafeNet Trusted Access is 2.0%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Duo3.2%
Thales SafeNet Trusted Access2.0%
Other94.8%
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

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.
GauravMathur - PeerSpot reviewer
Vice President Information Technology at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Simple to use, easy to set up, and performs well
I'm not saying that we want to switch the product, however, since the requirement has increased, we are looking at other options that may be better suited. The scalability may not there. We have a few specific use cases where we have to avoid the cloud. Especially in Europe, we're not allowed to carry their phone in factories. We need some sort of secure access solution. There's a dependency on Microsoft Azure. I am paying to SafeNet and in parallel, I also need to pay Microsoft to use the same service. That makes no sense, to pay double. If they could do something about it, that would be very good.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The biggest benefit of Cisco Duo for my customers is the license because they count licenses for the user—one user can use many applications integrated with Cisco Duo."
"It is really scalable. It is easy once you get an application in. You can import users from Active Directory and enroll users really fast."
"It has definitely decreased our security risk."
"The app has greater stability than rival solutions such as Google Authenticator, and Duo Push authentication is a valuable feature."
"Cisco Duo seems very scalable; in my experience, I started with a small-medium business, and in my last contracting position, it was a large one for a major worldwide airline that had hundreds of thousands of devices that could use Cisco Duo, and it scaled very well."
"If you have to log in to something, you must go to Duo Security to confirm that you're who you are on your phone."
"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."
"Duo offers dual-factor authentication for our logins; I put in my credentials and hit go, then I get an alert on my Apple Watch and approve it, and that part is just phenomenal."
"I recommend this solution because it protects information."
"The solution is simple to use."
"The interface is easy to use."
"Right now, we only have a small use case for the product, however, it has performed well."
"The validation and integrity features of the endpoint are great."
"The interface is easy to use."
 

Cons

"I think the prices of Cisco Duo are quite fair, but the main problem is that Microsoft Authenticator is built-in with M365, so everyone is switching to that and using it instead of Cisco Duo because it costs extra as a standalone product."
"Integration between Duo Security and FTDs needs improvement. Integrating Next Generation Firewall safety with Duo Security currently requires a proxy agent between Active Directory and the appliance. It's an additional factor that we need to think about. It would be great to have direct integration with FTD so that we don't have to worry about middleware products. For the rest of the Cisco Secure solutions, the APIs need improvement."
"Cisco Duo is stable, but occasionally there are emails about incidents that affect some services temporarily."
"Regarding the pricing, setup costs, and licensing, I find that for some companies using Azure, they question why they should switch when they already have Microsoft Authenticator, which can make it commercially challenging when explaining why they need to transition to Cisco Duo."
"I'm unsure how to disable the ping notification sound on my phone when using Cisco Duo. I don't know how to silence it."
"Areas that have room for improvement in Cisco Duo include pricing, as Cisco is quite expensive, and the fact that Cisco Duo relies heavily on external identity providers such as Active Directory or Entra ID and does not offer full identity lifecycle management on its own, which leads organizations to often pair Cisco Duo with another IAM solution for complete identity governance."
"The new smart license model doesn't always work. It's very complicated."
"The dashboard needs to be improved."
"SafeNet's reporting and monitoring features could be improved."
"The scalability may not be there."
"SafeNet's reporting and monitoring features could be improved."
"I'd like to see more networking features, such as the ability to integrate network monitoring solutions and authenticate the app users."
"Lacks the ability to integrate network monitoring solutions and authenticate the app users."
"There's a dependency on Microsoft Azure."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Cisco's licensing is always a bit complicated to understand, but the price is fair. It could be more expensive than others, but the way they integrate everything, it has a fair price."
"The pricing was a lot more than what we were paying for our previous solution."
"The licensing is very good because it does not cost a lot of money. It's affordable for all-sized customers, including enterprises. There is an additional cost for premium support."
"Duo Security is free."
"Their pricing model is a little bit weird. Currently, there is no price advantage in signing up for yearly contracts. There are no additional costs to the standard licensing costs."
"I rate the product pricing a seven out of ten."
"With regard to pricing, for a small business buying a one off, it's pretty expensive. If it's an enterprise that has thousands of employees, however, it's really nothing to protect your data because if your network goes down or it's breached, you're losing millions of dollars every minute. When it comes to a large enterprise, it's priced where it should be because you're talking business to business. You're not talking business to consumer."
"I haven't seen any information on the pricing in four years, so I can't comment on that."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Educational Organization
6%
Construction Company
11%
Performing Arts
9%
Government
7%
Legal Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business45
Midsize Enterprise24
Large Enterprise58
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 the pricing, setup costs, and licensing of Cisco Duo shows that it is a cost above our Entra costs, which we are always reviewing. The benefits outweigh the cost in terms of its ...
What needs improvement with Duo Security?
I believe Cisco Duo needs to be improved on the delay process because there is a delay when we send a Duo Push or when we are signing into any applications. We can work on making it faster and spee...
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Also Known As

Duo Security
SafeNet Trusted Access, Gemalto SafeNet Trusted Access
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
IBM, Western Union, Vanderbilt University Medical Centre, Novartis, and AT&T.
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Duo vs. Thales SafeNet Trusted Access and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,311 professionals have used our research since 2012.