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IBM Security Verify Access vs Microsoft Entra ID comparison

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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

Omada Identity
Sponsored
Ranking in Identity Management (IM)
4th
Ranking in Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS)
5th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
48
Ranking in other categories
User Provisioning Software (3rd), Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM) (3rd)
IBM Security Verify Access
Ranking in Identity Management (IM)
25th
Ranking in Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS)
18th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (14th), Access Management (13th)
Microsoft Entra ID
Ranking in Identity Management (IM)
1st
Ranking in Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS)
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
234
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (1st), Authentication Systems (1st), Access Management (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (2nd)
 

Featured Reviews

Pernilla Hulth - PeerSpot reviewer
The interface is easy to use and gives you a solid overview
The cloud-based deployment was straightforward, but the on-prem deployment was in a highly complex ecosystem. Omada has matured since then. I wouldn't say that it isn't straightforward, but it depends on the customer. A standard deployment is relatively easy, but it can be more painful if you need a lot of customization. We deployed the cloud solution in around four months, nearly meeting the 12-week benchmark. The on-prem deployment took three years. It was a highly complex ecosystem that was dependent on other systems. Depending on the size of your environment, you need a product owner and some specialists for maintenance. My last customer was a university with a complex environment. They had around 12 people involved in maintenance at that organization. Typically, it's between 2-5 people.
AsifIqbal - PeerSpot reviewer
Has good scalability and is stable with no glitches; has a multi-factor authentication feature
What we'd like improved in IBM Security Access Manager is its onboarding process as it's complex, particularly when onboarding new applications. We need to be very, very careful during the onboarding. We have no issues with IBM Security Access Manager because the solution works fine, apart from the onboarding process and IBM's involvement in onboarding issues. If we need support related to the onboarding, we've noticed a pattern where support isn't available, or they don't have much experience, or we're not getting a response from them. We're facing the same issue with IBM Guardium. As we're just focusing on the multi-factor authentication feature of IBM Security Access Manager and we didn't explore any other features, we don't have additional features to suggest for the next release of the solution, but we're in discussion about exploring ID management and access management features, but those are just possibilities because right now, we're focused on exploring our domain.
Bahram Piri - PeerSpot reviewer
Security focus and seamless implementation increase platform productivity
Microsoft Entra ID can be improved in many ways, and there's a big wish list.If we're focusing on security, something that I definitely expect is improvement in the UI and UX for frontline workers. This is important, especially for non-tech savvy individuals. It is something Microsoft Entra ID could do to improve for a wider audience. It's important to focus on the frontline workers since they are non-tech savvy individuals. They are not like those back-office engineering C-level employees who are constantly dealing with computers, and we need to build a specific user experience and user interface for them to handle this stuff. That's something I expect Microsoft to focus on more for Microsoft Entra ID.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We don't have to go in and do a lot of the work that we did before. It may have saved us somewhere in the range of 10 to 30 percent of the time we spent on provisioning access."
"Omada's most valuable aspect is its usability."
"The most valuable feature for us is the ability to set up connectors to various IT systems and offer a wide range of supported connectors."
"The customer success and support teams have been crucial."
"The most valuable aspect of the product is that it is Microsoft-based and it supports all Microsoft technology."
"The support response time and the freedom from strange bugs and strange things happening in the software are valuable."
"The best feature in Omada Identity is that it enables us to implement standardized employee life cycle processes so that we don't have to create them ourselves. We can then use the standard workflows. The breadth and scope of the solution’s IGA features also fulfill our requirements."
"The most appealing aspect of Omada Identity is its self-service upgrade system."
"The solution has powerful authentification and authorization. It offers a good way to increase security."
"It's a good solution for identification and access management."
"I have found this solution to be really practical and when a user wants to log in, it is effortless and runs smooth."
"The most valuable feature of IBM Security Access Manager, at least for my company, is multi-factor authentication. That's the only feature my company is using. The solution works well and has no glitches. IBM Security Access Manager is a very good solution, so my company is still using it."
"From the integration point of view, it supports SAML, OIDC, and OAuth. For legacy applications that don't have support for SAML and other new protocols, it provides single sign-on access to end-users. From the integration compatibility point of view, it is highly capable."
"Its stability and UI are most valuable."
"The tool provides a password vault, single sign-on, and multifactor authentication. It offers various authentication methods like fingerprint integration, one-time passwords, or tokens sent via email or SMS. This ensures secure access to your accounts by providing multiple authentication options."
"Microsoft Azure AD is easy to install and is a stable solution."
"The technical support is pretty good."
"Entra ID provides an excellent overview of the applications and the options applied to them."
"Entra ID enables us to implement security easily and effectively."
"Entra ID is our directory that registers all users, guest users, and even labs. It's integrated with Microsoft technologies like Authenticator, SSO, and MFA, streamlining operations and creating a seamless environment."
"The most important things of Azure Active Directory are the security and the facility to manage all the services and users. It is very easy to manage users and assign roles, permissions, and access. At the same time, it is a very secure environment. Microsoft takes security very seriously. They take care of all the security and all the factors to prevent any kind of data or information compromise."
"Microsoft Entra ID is regarded as the best ID management suite for integrating applications using SAML 2.0 for single sign-on."
"The central authentication server is most valuable. GPOs are useful for user and computer policies."
 

Cons

"Omada could communicate better with us about the product roadmap. We haven't gotten any updates about it. The user interface is often a bit difficult to understand. It isn't optimized for small screens, so it doesn't display all of the information clearly, so users need to scroll a lot."
"The comprehensiveness of Omada's out-of-the-box connectors for the applications we use could be better. We are getting a new HR system called Cornerstone for which they do not have an out-of-the-box connector, so we have to take the REST connector and play around with it."
"The web GUI can be improved."
"Its flexibility is both a good thing and a bad thing. Because it is very flexible, it also becomes too complex. This is common for most of the products we evaluated. Its scalability should be better. It had a few scalability issues."
"I am not working with the product, but they have this BI tool for role-based mining, and I think that should be included in the core product rather than an add-on."
"We are still on Omada on-prem, but I understand that when Omada is in the cloud, you cannot send an attachment via email. We have some emails with attachments for new employees because we have to explain to them how to register and do their multi-factor authentication. All that information is in the attachment. People have to do that before they are in our system. We cannot give them a link to our Intranet and SharePoint because they do not yet have access. They have to register before that, so I need to send the attachments, but this functionality is not there in the cloud."
"When the re-certification process is launched that makes Omada very slow. There are performance issues in the current version."
"I would like more training. As someone who is new to this world, I don't feel that the courses Omada provides are good enough. They should also improve the documentation. It is difficult to learn how to use the solution by yourself"
"What we'd like improved in IBM Security Access Manager is its onboarding process as it's complex, particularly when onboarding new applications. We need to be very, very careful during the onboarding. We have no issues with IBM Security Access Manager because the solution works fine, apart from the onboarding process and IBM's involvement in onboarding issues. If we need support related to the onboarding, we've noticed a pattern where support isn't available, or they don't have much experience, or we're not getting a response from them. We're facing the same issue with IBM Guardium. As we're just focusing on the multi-factor authentication feature of IBM Security Access Manager and we didn't explore any other features, we don't have additional features to suggest for the next release of the solution, but we're in discussion about exploring ID management and access management features, but those are just possibilities because right now, we're focused on exploring our domain."
"The user interface needs to be simplified, it's complex and not user-friendly."
"There are a lot of areas that can be improved, but the main area is the lack of customization. You cannot easily customize anything in the product. It is not easy to tweak the functionality. It is challenging to change the out-of-the-box functionality."
"The solution could be classified as a hilt system. There are a lot of resources being used and it is suitable for very large enterprises or the public sector."
"Configuration could be simplified for the end-user."
"The user interface for users and administrators could be improved to make it easier. Automating some functions could also be beneficial."
"They can improve the single sign-on configuration for OIDC and OAuth. That is not very mature in this product, and they can improve it in this particular area. OIDC is a third-party integration that we do with the cloud platforms, and OAuth is an authorization mechanism for allowing a user having an account with Google or any other provider to access an application. Organizations these days are looking for just-in-time provisioning use cases, but IBM Security Access Manager is not very mature for such use cases. There are only a few applications that can be integrated, and this is where this product is lagging. However, in terms of configuration and single sign-on mechanisms, it is a great product."
"In my opinion, Microsoft sometimes releases products too early without providing enough documentation. Our team works with innovative solutions like verified ID, identity governance ,and lifecycle workflow. When we started with lifecycle workflows, we had only two integrated worklows. Still, we couldn't find much of the information we needed in the documentation about our use case or how to leverage IDs in our proof of concept."
"Though the installation was seamless, it took longer than expected to be completed."
"It would be an improvement if Authenticator made it easier to recover the app if you reboot your cellphone and lose access."
"Entra could be improved by enhancing self-service options for end users, such as making password reset options more accessible."
"At the free or basic level of service, Azure should provide identity protection features including single sign-on and multifactor authentication."
"Documentation I think is always the worst part with what Azure's doing right now across the board."
"Compared to what we can do on-prem, Azure AD lacks a feature for multiple hierarchical groups. For example, Group A is part of group B. Group B is part of group C. Then, if I put someone into group A, which is part of already B, they get access to any system that group B has access to, and that provisioning is automatically there."
"Initially, we wanted to exclude specific users from MSA. So, we had a condition policy, which forces MSA for all the users. So we wanted to exclude users who are using an NPS extension. So it was not listed, as a NPS extension was not listed outside an application, in actual, so, we go back and were not able to exclude users using NPS extension from MSA. So that was one limitation that we found and we had to work around that."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is not cheap. It is expensive, but compared to what we did almost three years ago, it is value for money. It is worth it."
"While Omada Identity carries a premium price tag, it proves to be cost-effective."
"Omada is too expensive. We are in the automotive industry. The pricing might be high because most of the other customers are in the insurance or banking sectors, but it's steep for an auto supply company."
"Omada continues to be very competitive on pricing, especially on the Omada cloud product."
"Omada Identity offers a reasonable price point, but it will increase as we transition to the cloud."
"The pricing for Omada Identity is fair."
"Omada Identity is competitively priced and delivers good value for our money."
"It's a fair price for the on-premises system. Compared with what we had before, it's much cheaper and we get all the modules in one. We tried to go with the cloud, but it was far too expensive."
"It costs about 300K AED for a year. Its pricing is a bit on the higher end, but in comparison to other products in the market, its price is still better. There are lots of other products that are very costly."
"The product is not expensive. It depends on the number of users."
"The license and costs depend on the amount range of users you have. For just approximately 2,000 users, the price is practical and fair. However, when you have 20,000 users, it starts to become really expensive, and the discount per user is not attractive enough to go ahead and purchase."
"It's really affordable."
"Azure AD's pricing is comprehensive and affordable. The prices are easy to understand, and the licenses include a variety of security monitoring and additional features."
"The solution has three types of tiers: E1 has very basic features. You get limited stuff in E2 and cannot have Office 360 associated with it. E3 is on the costly side and has all the features."
"The process for buying licenses from Microsoft is somewhat messy and really hard to do. We have to talk to someone because it's hard to find out how many licenses we need. If I'm applying for 2,000 users, how many Windows licenses do we need? They could also charge less for support."
"If you're on Azure, it can be free or it's incorporated, at no extra cost, or it can become extremely complicated."
"Pricing could always be better. You pay the premium for Microsoft. Sometimes, it is worth it, and at other times, you wish to have more licensing options, especially for smaller companies."
"We are working with the Premium P2 licenses, which are reasonable. If you invest in the on-premises environment setup, then it costs so much. However, on-prem AD gives you the ability to manage your organization in a very organized manner, where you can create a group policy."
"I'm not totally aware of the pricing and licensing, but I do know that the pricing and licensing must be quite balanced. We are a pretty old client of Microsoft, and MSA is just one of the services we use from Microsoft. There's a whole Microsoft 365 suite that's implemented as well. I'm sure it is something that is acceptable to both parties."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
24%
Insurance Company
16%
Government
11%
Computer Software Company
11%
Educational Organization
29%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Omada Identity Cloud?
As an administrator, we benefit from a lot of functionality that is available out of the box, but it is also configur...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Omada Identity Cloud?
They are positioned at a good price point. They are lower than some of their competitors.
What needs improvement with Omada Identity Cloud?
The biggest issue, which is the reason why we are transitioning from their product to SailPoint, is the overall user ...
What do you like most about IBM Security Access Manager?
The tool provides a password vault, single sign-on, and multifactor authentication. It offers various authentication ...
What needs improvement with IBM Security Access Manager?
The user interface for users and administrators could be improved to make it easier. Automating some functions could ...
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 Du...
What do you like most about Azure Active Directory?
It is very simple. The Active Directory functions are very easy for us. Its integration with anything is very easy. W...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Active Directory?
Regarding pricing, for the services we receive, it seems within the market range and about average.
 

Also Known As

Omada Identity Suite, Omada Identity Cloud
IBM Security Verify Access (SVA), IBM Security Access Manager, ISAM
Azure AD, Azure Active Directory, Azure Active Directory, Microsoft Authenticator
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bayer, ECCO Shoes, Vattenfall, NuStar Energy, Unicredit, Schiphol Group, BMW Group, Deutsche Leasing
POST Luxembourg
Microsoft Entre ID is trusted by companies of all sizes and industries including Walmart, Zscaler, Uniper, Amtrak, monday.com, and more.
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Security Verify Access vs. Microsoft Entra ID and other solutions. Updated: May 2025.
851,491 professionals have used our research since 2012.