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CyberArk Identity vs Symantec Siteminder comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 11, 2024

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

CyberArk Identity
Ranking in Access Management
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (9th), Identity Management (IM) (9th), Authorization Software (3rd), Enterprise Password Managers (8th), User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (9th), Active Directory Management (8th), Cloud Resource Access Management (3rd), Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM) (7th)
Symantec Siteminder
Ranking in Access Management
12th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
75
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (13th), Web Access Management (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Access Management category, the mindshare of CyberArk Identity is 3.4%, up from 2.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Siteminder is 3.3%, down from 4.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Access Management
 

Featured Reviews

Julio Montero - PeerSpot reviewer
Access management system provides strong security and effortless user authentication
The solution can be deployed on cloud or on-premises. CyberArk is more on the cloud than on local hardware. The deployment is initially quite difficult. That said, when you are doing the implementation of CyberArk, there are so many tutorials that make the learning process very easy. The only complaint could be the language barrier. It's difficult if you don't have a very good level of English. Otherwise, it is very easy. You can have it set up within three months without much difficulty. It's hard to get started, however, once you get going, it gets easier. A full deployment takes half a year or less. There is some maintenance necessary. A company is constantly hiring and letting go of employees. The access is always changing, so access must always be adjusted. Or, if we need another law of filter, we would need to add those, or even take them away. That's another aspect of maintenance.
Muzi Lubisi - PeerSpot reviewer
Improved user experience with seamless integration and easy installation
The feature that I mostly valued is the ease of installation on different systems, especially on Windows. Additionally, it is very beneficial for deploying single sign-on sessions between different windows on a web browser, provided I am connected to the right identity provider. That seamless integration significantly improves user experience and efficiency.

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 of CyberArk Identity is the single sign-on feature that offers quick and one-click access."
"The user self-service program and the Office 365 provisioning service feature are the most valuable. It is a very easy and feature-rich solution that gives priority to the users and security."
"The setup, via cloud, is simple."
"The tool helps with authentication. It acts as an MFA for any kind of privileged access that occurs in our organization."
"The user identification is simplified, and managing user privileges, whether adding or revoking them, is also quite straightforward when utilizing CyberArk SaaS."
"CyberArk Identity's ability to safeguard financial services infrastructure is good."
"Overall, I would rate CyberArk Identity a nine out of ten."
"The most valuable features of CyberArk Identity are its ability to control access to administrative staff."
"The Directory is secure. It's our user store, and it's important to keep our members safe. The product does well with that."
"Right now, federation that comes out-of-the-box with single sign-on is the most valuable feature that we have, and also scalability."
"It's agent-based. It's convenient to deploy and integrate."
"That seamless integration significantly improves user experience and efficiency."
"Siteminder allows us to manage identity and portability control efficiently."
"You can quickly deploy the entire product with a basic config within couple of hours."
"It has considerably reduced the amount of time that new users would take to join into the organization. Previously, it was a lengthy, manual process because it's a very secure environment, where they need to verify the user before they can actually grant him a user-ID and password. Integrating with the built-in custom application, and exposing CA Single Sign On to the internet, we were able to get the employees onboard. The time that we gained was: previously it would generally take from four to eight weeks for each employee, we brought it to one to two days."
"Federation is valuable, for sure, because we have a lot of third-party vendors that we need to integrate with, and this is a turnkey solution in some ways."
 

Cons

"One area for improvement is the complexity of the learning curve for new users."
"The product needs to leverage the cloud more, especially in the financial sector, where cloud adoption might be limited. Proper reporting within the cloud is essential. The tool should be more user-friendly to expedite access for users. The current agent-based system poses challenges if a user loses access to the server, making tasks difficult to perform. It should also improve technical support."
"CyberArk Identity could improve by having the ability to better manage the network, such as Cisco. There seem to be some issues in this area."
"In terms of general user feedback, the more security you put in front of a user, the more they complain. So usability and the user experience are always a challenge. So there's always room for improvement."
"Integration or deployment is extremely difficult for CyberArk Identity."
"At the moment CyberArk needs to enrich Conjur and it needs to be made more viable so that its adoption can be made much faster."
"To enhance the product, they can consider improving the user interface of the software and possibly the customer support team."
"We would like to see an improvement in the ability to manage mobile devices."
"To add more value to this solution it needs to be more user-friendly."
"Symantec Siteminder needs to have adaptive authentication and multi-factor authentication as integrated features."
"The Federation part of CA Single Sign On, it's a bit complex to implement because it involves the SSL certificates, exchange of certificates, and lot of technical details. The documentation misses some important parts of this, so that's the reason it took some time for us to go live."
"As we are moving in to the mobility space, this is where we really see SiteMinder and their other product really come together to provide a solution base to a different area where the IoT is coming, the different business communications are happening. All of those things require authentication and we really want to see this product grow into that role."
"If the reporting feature can be integrated into SSO itself that will be an icing on the cake."
"Siteminder needs to improve its user experience."
"The initial setup of Symantec SiteMinder was a bit tricky. I would rate it a seven on a scale of one to ten, where ten indicates an easy setup."
"We are finding some compatibility issues. We're still working with CA on them."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of CyberArk Identity is competitive."
"Their pricing is obviously a lot higher than many vendors in the marketplace but their service is also unmatched."
"The solution is cheap and I rate its pricing an eight out of ten."
"In terms of pricing, BeyondTrust and CyberArk tend to be more expensive, with CyberArk receiving an eight out of ten, in this regard."
"I think it is a fairly priced tool. I rate the tool between six and seven on a scale of one to ten where one is expensive, and ten is cheap."
"There could be some additional costs apart from the licensing costs of the solution when you want to develop connectors in CyberArk Identity."
"We find that the pricing and licensing of this solution is adequate, as compared to the other competitors in the market."
"CyberArk Identity is an expensive solution."
"The price is quite comparable to the other enterprise-level solutions in that market."
"I recommend conducting a PoC on every available product before choose one."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"CA solutions are generally expensive but for the customer the ROI is big."
"Symantec Siteminder is expensive; they could definitely do better on the price."
"Siteminder is a little costly. You pay for licensing, and they offer packages, so if you have less users, then you have to buy different products at different prices. If you have more of a user base, then the package is different. They also include other features—for example, if you have a database and you're using Siteminder, then it's good to use a Semantic-specific database, but if you are using less, then you have to purchase the database separately. Whereas if you are going for a bigger license, then it comes within the package. It depends on which plan you are using."
"The solution's pricing is competitive."
"The licensing is fair for this solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
30%
Insurance Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Transportation Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about CyberArk Identity?
The integration capabilities, ability to integrate CyberArk into the overall IBB strategy of our current clients.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CyberArk Identity?
The pricing is acceptable. It is worth considering what we are protecting with the amount charged.
What needs improvement with CyberArk Identity?
Some areas experience slowness based on the workload. There's a need to enhance network performance despite the good user experience with access management.
What do you like most about Symantec Siteminder?
It's agent-based. It's convenient to deploy and integrate.
What needs improvement with Symantec Siteminder?
Symantec Siteminder needs to have adaptive authentication and multi-factor authentication as integrated features. Currently, multi-factor authentication is available as a separate solution, and it ...
 

Also Known As

Idaptive
SiteMinder, CA SSO, Layer7 SiteMinder
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

MLB, Citi, Pfizer, SulAmerica, GE Capital, Shiseido
British Telecom, CoreBlox, DBS, HMS, Itera ASA and Simeo
Find out what your peers are saying about CyberArk Identity vs. Symantec Siteminder and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,384 professionals have used our research since 2012.