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IBM Tivoli Access Manager [EOL] vs Okta Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 22, 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

IBM Tivoli Access Manager [...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
3.8
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Okta Platform
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
102
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (2nd), Authentication Systems (4th), Privileged Access Management (PAM) (3rd), Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (2nd), Access Management (2nd), ZTNA as a Service (4th), Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM) (1st), AI IT Support (2nd)
 

Featured Reviews

it_user711612 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Consultant at a insurance company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Reverse proxy provides central control over authentication and authorization.
It is a single product that caters for all the business needs throughout the organization. It provides a seamless integration that in turn encourages most of the applications to use the SSO features Reverse proxy is the most valuable feature as it provides central control over authentication and…
SN
Identity and Access Management Specialist at a university with 10,001+ employees
Automated lifecycle management has cut onboarding times and now drives secure, clean access
Although I am a fan of Okta Platform overall, there are areas where it could improve security outcomes and reduce admin friction. My top improvement areas include the system log and analytics upgrade, which are great for point troubleshooting, but trending and root cause analysis across large tenants still require exporting to SIEM. Verbose queries and long-range retention costs can add up. Additionally, while certificate rotations are better than most, the process is still manual for busy portfolios, especially concerning multi-SP SAML certificate rotations and app metadata drift. Two more buckets of potential improvements for Okta Platform involve user experience and security. There is the issue of push fatigue and prompt sprawl, where users receive multiple prompts across different apps and sessions. I arrived at the rating of eight because the core controls are strong and reliable, but a few operational UX and UI gaps prevent it from being rated higher. The reasons for not giving it a nine or ten include ongoing issues concerning safety and change safety, the complexity of group rules and mappings, and the lack of robustness in policy management. Additionally, there remains a need for more manual involvement than necessary, especially for large portfolios and dual certificate rotation, along with proactive SP data metadata validation.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Single Sign-On functionality is valuable because the core purpose of the product is to allow universal (or bespoke) SSO for application suites."
"IBM directory server offers the best roll-out experience."
"We have managed to automate the creation of all employees, and the company's clients and then assign the accounts/accesses according to business need."
"It provided a secure and robust end to end security solution."
"Flexibility to connect with different environments and product stability are the best features."
"Since its birth it is an unbelievable stable product."
"Capabilities of advanced security are enhanced to support strong, flexible authentifications and authentications based on risks as well as critical internet vulnerabilities."
"Tivoli Access Manager (or IBM Security Access Manager) is a fully featured web authentication, sso and authorization product."
"Other than Okta being an easy and awesome integration tool, one of the best features it has is the provisioning and deprovisioning, which makes management way easier."
"Okta Platform authentication is essential because it minimizes the hassle of signing into multiple applications while maintaining security."
"The product requires very little maintenance."
"We find the solution to be reliable for our customers and it is nice that it is cloud-based and can be accessed from anywhere."
"One of the best features of Okta Workforce Identity is its integration with different SaaS applications, which makes it a better product than the competitors."
"The most valuable features of Okta Workforce Identity are MFA, and SSO, which have high security."
"The feature that is most valuable to me is the automated user provisioning that we set up using Okta as a major part of that process."
"Okta has more when it comes to the policy level. It has distinctive features where you can do a mix and combination to have users access applications for various business cases."
 

Cons

"I would rate the technical support a 6/10."
"Installation and configuration. If you don’t know the requirements of the supporting components, it could be complicated to install and this has been improved in the later versions that are renamed to IBM Tivoli Security Access Manager."
"The license model is pretty complex."
"The user interface looks like it was designed for technical personnel only."
"Administration of the product can be improved a lot."
"The whole product could be made into one suite instead of multiple components which are essentially a part of the same infrastructure."
"We have had stability issues lately with the hardware and SAN that the product runs on."
"An Amazon Machine Image (AMI) for the newer appliance versions for hosting the virtual appliances on AWS will help."
"The solution is very expensive."
"There are some issues with the interface that can be improved."
"The only aspect in which it can be improved is that the interface could be cleaner. I found this even when I was trying to do my certification exam because the certification is hands-on. You find yourself fumbling around a little bit to find simple things. This happens even when you start to get familiar with the product."
"There is an access request system that is very limited access to the systems available for end-users."
"It only facilitates provisioning and not de-provisioning."
"On the admin side, we can create our own passwords instead of generating one, which is usually difficult to explain to a user."
"Some limitations in scalability. Each application we work with can be completely different, resulting in highly variable implementation processes."
"The high cost of the product is an area of concern where improvements are required."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The IBM prices are, as ever, extortionate, even with a business partnership, and high levels of discounts."
"I believe it competes well. The pricing is pretty competitive. I know that Microsoft also provides something similar with its MFA and identity services."
"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."
"It has a yearly subscription. As compared to its competitors, it is quite expensive. It also has a complex licensing model."
"Workforce Identity is well-priced."
"The pricing for Okta Workforce Identity could still be improved or made cheaper. It costs from 50 to 100 euros a year per user. Okta Workforce Identity has different packages you can choose from, and my previous company had all of them, particularly the full Okta suite."
"We pay 23 pence (approximately $0.30 USD) per user, annually, for 150,000 users."
"This solution is costly. Pricing is decent if you have less users, but it significantly goes up the more users you have, with its cost not justified."
"The solution’s pricing needs to be reasonable. You are dealing with a lot of components and the pricing is component-based."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
18%
Marketing Services Firm
16%
Performing Arts
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise18
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business44
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise50
 

Questions from the Community

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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?
Currently, in Okta Workforce Identity we get the two-digit authentication code. Instead of getting the two-digit authentication code, if we had an option to do fingerprint verification, that would ...
 

Also Known As

Tivoli Access Manager, IBM Security Access Manager
Okta Customer Identity, Workforce Identity
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Essex Technology Group Inc.
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 Microsoft, Okta, Cisco and others in Single Sign-On (SSO). Updated: March 2026.
885,837 professionals have used our research since 2012.