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IBM Cloud Identity Service vs Okta Workforce Identity comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 2, 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

IBM Cloud Identity Service
Ranking in Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS)
30th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Okta Workforce Identity
Ranking in Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS)
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (3rd), Authentication Systems (5th), Privileged Access Management (PAM) (6th), Access Management (2nd), ZTNA as a Service (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) category, the mindshare of IBM Cloud Identity Service is 0.4%, down from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Okta Workforce Identity is 13.3%, up from 13.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS)
 

Featured Reviews

AS
All of its features are valuable but the support needs improvement
It is multiple identity and access management, so all of the applications are valuable. It's also part of the automated process The support needs improvement.  I have been using IBM Cloud Identity Service for the last five years.  It is stable.  It is scalable.  We have 5,000 users using this…
Tor Nordhagen - PeerSpot reviewer
Extremely easy to work with, simple to set up, and reasonably priced
The drawback of this solution is that in our shops, many staff members sometimes have to be borrowed from one shop to another and the solution does not really support having multiple roles. The user experience we would like to have when a person works in shop A which pays their salary is that they should have access to pretty much everything. Maybe you have somebody who is a manager in that shop A, he should be able to order new wear, he should be able to change the pricing, he should be able to empty the cash registry, and ship it to the bank. But when for instance, in COVID, people had to fill in for people in shops where a lot of people were sick, then they had to actually use user accounts of people that work in shop B. If you were employed in shop A, you could not work in shop B without borrowing somebody else's user ID and password. Which is really bad. We haven't been able to work around that and Okta Workforce Identity does not have a solution for it. We are now piloting their identity governance solution. Obviously, it's easy to give somebody access, give them an account, and give them roles, but it's hard to maintain that. For example, if you moved from, say working in a shop to working in a warehouse. But why do you still have all this shop access? The solution has until now not had anything to really support the process of taking away access. But now we are in a better release program of Okta's identity governance solution. Although it's very basic, the solution has started on a journey, but identity governance is something that Okta Workforce Identity really needs to improve. The ability or the options in the solution for changing the look and feel are not good enough because in our partner portal, essentially what they have is an ugly admin interface. The admin interface is good enough for us technical people because that's all we need. We work with the product and we're able to see the data but when it comes to presenting the service portal, Okta Workforce Identity does not have any capabilities really for making it look pretty. To add branding and different graphical user interface elements than Okta basic for essentially delegated admin for the business-to-business portal is horrifying because you're essentially using the tech admin. The only option we had and used, was to take the tech admin console and strip it. so that a vendor that has some goods that are sold in the shops, when they want to add a user on their side, say a driver or a packer on their side who should know how much they've packed in a truck to come to our warehouse, then the user interface that this vendor is using, these functional people will then have to use an extremely basic user interface.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is multiple identity and access management, so all of the applications are valuable. It's also part of the automated process."
"One of the most valuable features of IBM Cloud Identity Service is that it delivers integrations with the commercial SaaS software that's available."
"It is stable. We can automate many of our daily operations with it, and we don't have to manage many things manually."
"The initial setup of Okta Workforce Identity is straightforward. I was able to get an environment ready within half a day."
"First of all, the solution is very simple."
"We face no challenges in integrating the product with our legacy systems."
"The most valuable functions are Single Sign-On (SSO) and Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)."
"The MFA part is the best. MFA provided most of the security that we were looking at with respect to the second level of authentication. Okta Workforce Identity provides a number of options with respect to multifactor authentication, such as the app, phone call, and text. These options provide different ways of logging in for users, and they were a lot more than what we needed. This is certainly a very good feature of Okta Workforce Identity."
"The tool provides a single place of contact for managing users. We only need to manage users in Okta Workforce Identity, eliminating the need to duplicate efforts across different systems. For example, if a user needs to be decommissioned, we don't have to go through all the systems and cloud services; we delete the user in one place. This process is automated with our HR system for both organizations, simplifying user lifecycle management."
"Okta Workforce Identity is easy to use and has a lot of components."
"The product requires very little maintenance."
 

Cons

"IBM Cloud Identity Service is going in the right direction with the product. They need to keep building out the integrations and having the library is very critical."
"The initial setup is complex, it's not straightforward. It takes months because it's not straightforward."
"Everything can be more stable and secure. There could also be more account features. I would like to be able to do more things through it to manage users' accounts."
"On the admin side, we can create our own passwords instead of generating one, which is usually difficult to explain to a user."
"The solution lacks an on-premises deployment model so it can't offer a hybrid solution. It would be ideal if clients had options that weren't just cloud-based."
"The error logging could be improved. Okta doesn't provide enough details when you are troubleshooting an issue. It's often difficult to fix it from our end, so we always need additional support from Okta."
"We've not had any problems with Okta."
"It is challenging to obtain a comprehensive backup."
"We had some implementation issues."
"We have experienced some challenges in integrating this solution with Scope and Cognito."
"There should be automated aggregation and complete classification processes included in it."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution is expensive for non-enterprise companies. IBM's always going to be a little more expensive, you're going to be paying a premium. However, depending on the organization's needs, there's probably a benefit there to do even with the price being the way it is."
"The product has a user-based license model."
"Okta has fairly competitive pricing."
"I believe it competes well. The pricing is pretty competitive. I know that Microsoft also provides something similar with its MFA and identity services."
"The product's price is high. For each feature, a certain payment is required."
"The price of Okta Workforce Identity is reasonable."
"Though I don't know about the licensing model of the product, I wouldn't be surprised if Okta offers a per user license subscription model."
"The licensing is per user per month and includes full technical support."
"The product is expensive compared to other vendors."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
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What do you like most about Okta Workforce Identity?
Okta has introduced the Universal Directory. It has custom attribute capability and user permissions to read/write on their profiles or hide them. Profile sources and identity profile sourcing are ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Okta Workforce Identity?
Pricing for Okta is reasonably not that much, however, I don't have access to the commercial aspect.
What needs improvement with Okta Workforce Identity?
Okta should have at least a local presense for countries that align with or comply with GDPR or data sovereignty, so there are no compliance or audit questions. There are integration issues with Of...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Baxter Healthcare, 
FedEx, Zoom, Takeda, Lululemon Athletica, GrunHub, jetBlue, McKensson, Bain & Company, Engie, Peloton, Sonos, T-Mobile, Hewlett Packard, MGM Resorts, Ally Financial, Priceline, Albertsons, Itercom, Classy, FICO, Kensho, Live Nation, Drata, Rotary, and others.
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Cloud Identity Service vs. Okta Workforce Identity and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.