No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Idira Privileged Access Manager vs Top Secret comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 2, 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

Idira Privileged Access Man...
Ranking in Mainframe Security
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
230
Ranking in other categories
User Activity Monitoring (1st), Enterprise Password Managers (2nd), Privileged Access Management (PAM) (1st), Operational Technology (OT) Security (3rd)
Top Secret
Ranking in Mainframe Security
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
8.4
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Mainframe Security category, the mindshare of Idira Privileged Access Manager is 5.7%, up from 2.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Top Secret is 11.9%, down from 15.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Mainframe Security Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Idira Privileged Access Manager5.7%
Top Secret11.9%
Other82.4%
Mainframe Security
 

Featured Reviews

Atul-Gujar - PeerSpot reviewer
CyberArk manager at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Secures critical infrastructures with essential user session audit records
A potential area for improvement is enhancing support for cluster environments and distributed Vaults. Clients in multiple countries that need central access have different challenges that require better solutions from CyberArk. For financial services, CyberArk can improve incident response by ensuring fast support for critical priority tickets to meet compliance requirements. Providing more documentation on CyberArk is recommended for new team members to enhance their troubleshooting capabilities. I understand it's up to the client, but 99% fail to change the demo key, so it's crucial for CyberArk to emphasize changing the key and documenting it as part of the installation process.
it_user814482 - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Security Engineer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
All the features help ensure we are compliant with banking regulations
Top Secret is our external security manager for our mainframe systems It's an integral part of all of our mainframe security functions. It's the core of our mainframe security functions. It helps ensure that we are compliant with all of the various banking regulations, security regulations and…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The regulation of accounts is by far the most needed and valuable part of the application."
"The vault is almost a set-and-forget solution."
"It has helped from an auditing perspective identify who has access to privileged accounts."
"It has a lot of good tools, including everything we need."
"I find value in notifications from CyberArk when passwords fail verification and have other issues."
"The most important feature is managing the credentials and implementing those policies which rotate the credentials. Session Manager is also key in not letting the users have access to those credentials. Instead, CyberArk actually manages everything by itself."
"The most valuable feature is Special Monitoring."
"I have an affinity towards CyberArk; I find that it works out-of-the-box as a product."
"In banking, security is a priority, and we constantly get updates that meet our needs."
"When selecting a vendor, the most important thing is support."
"It protects our enterprise by providing an access monitor authentication protocol."
"We have an ongoing relationship with technical support; they are excellent."
"It's an integral part of all of our mainframe security functions and helps ensure that we are compliant with all of the various banking regulations, security regulations and requirements."
"It centralizes all the user security on a single tool, which has truly been the best part for us."
"The stability of the product is wonderful."
"We have implemented two-factor authentication, which is a new piece of CA Top Secret."
 

Cons

"Maintaining the product is challenging. Upgrades require a lot of resources, as it impacts the entire organization. For example, upgrading components like the Privileged Session Manager (PSM) and the vault is time-consuming and difficult. In the long term, I would like to see these processes simplified, especially for on-premise installations."
"Some of the additional features that we are looking at are in the Conjur product. I am specifically discussing key management, API Keys, and things for connecting applications in the CI/CD pipelines."
"I would like to see better usability for non-technical people."
"Additionally, I think the user experience needs to improve."
"With regards to potential improvements for the CyberArk product, I find the product quite expensive and I would like to see the cost reduced."
"Earlier in 9.0 version I faced some stability issues, yes there are some stability issues with CyberArk such as memory leakage, password unsync etc. These are some common problems but frustrating."
"Their post-sale support area requires a big improvement."
"Upgrading the product is very difficult, so this could be an area for improvement."
"In new releases, installation is not easy and can take about four months to roll out."
"That is an area where I have a concern, because I don't see them keeping pace with what we're doing."
"It would be helpful if they removed limitations on user record sizes."
"Make sure that there is a post-sale department in your country. We have experienced some post-sale problems to do with integration of CA products into our systems."
"As an IT auditor, the UI is the tough part. From the IT auditing standpoint, it needs to be more simple to use."
"The user interface could be improved. Sometimes, it is not simple to understand where a certain definition should be defined, and I go through a number of screens until I find where to do some of them."
"I'd like to see integration with LDAP's services, because today we have the mainframe and Windows AD separated."
"I would like to see better reporting, more emphasis on audit reporting, and better scrubbing of the canned reports."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Generally, I don't get involved in the licensing or the purchasing side of it, but I do know that the licenses are expensive."
"The solution is costly but we get what we pay for."
"It is in line with its competitors, but all such solutions cost too much money."
"I have heard from my leaders that CyberArk is costlier in terms of licensing. The support and maintenance are also costly. We use their premium support, but for the price we pay, we do not get the value."
"Pricing is a problem. CyberArk is expensive compared to other products I know. It is similar to buying a German car. It comes with all the bells and whistles, but some companies may find it too expensive."
"In comparison to other products on the market, CyberArk is a more costly product."
"CyberArk has been Gartner's number-one pick for the past ten years, so you can infer that their pricing is higher than everyone else. When you are the best, you will charge appropriately for it."
"There are no additional costs other than the standard licensing fees."
Information not available
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Mainframe Security solutions are best for your needs.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Outsourcing Company
13%
Construction Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business59
Midsize Enterprise42
Large Enterprise175
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business1
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

How does Sailpoint IdentityIQ compare with CyberArk PAM?
We evaluated Sailpoint IdentityIQ before ultimately choosing CyberArk. Sailpoint Identity Platform is a solution to manage risks in cloud enterprise environments. It automates and streamlines the m...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?
My thoughts on the pricing of CyberArk Privileged Access Manager depend entirely on the vendors' requirements. If they want their things to be secure, they have to spend accordingly. We have four t...
What needs improvement with CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?
I believe account discovery and rolling support need to be improved. Account discovery is important when integrating with other systems, as other PAM solutions can perform account discovery and onb...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

CyberArk Privileged Access Security, CyberArk Enterprise Password Vault
CA Top Secret
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Rockwell Automation
First Tennessee Bank
Find out what your peers are saying about Idira Privileged Access Manager vs. Top Secret and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.