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Microsoft Defender for Identity vs Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Microsoft Defender for Iden...
Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite
6th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
28
Ranking in other categories
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (8th), Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) (1st)
Microsoft Purview Communica...
Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite
32nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
GRC (16th), Digital Risk Protection (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Microsoft Security Suite category, the mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Identity is 3.4%, down from 6.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is 1.6%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Microsoft Security Suite Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Defender for Identity3.4%
Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance1.6%
Other95.0%
Microsoft Security Suite
 

Featured Reviews

CM
Technology Coordinator at a educational organization with 501-1,000 employees
Helps detect threats faster and prioritize critical security tasks with increased visibility
The feature I value most about Microsoft Defender for Identity is the ability to see where people are attempting to log in from. Microsoft Defender for Identity helps me automate routine tasks and find alerts that I set up to receive, so it helps me get where I'm trying to go easier and faster. I can see where everything is at. Microsoft Defender for Identity helps me prioritize important tasks. If I get an alert for a user who downloaded an application that is not sanctioned, I normally go straight to that user's computer device to find the device name and the user. Now I can get to them much faster. Microsoft Defender for Identity saves me time overall. I can quantify the time saved by Microsoft Defender for Identity as maybe 25 minutes, or if expressed as a percentage, maybe 20 to 25%. Some of the learning curve and actually learning what these products do takes time to figure out. Microsoft Defender for Identity definitely helps decrease the time of detection and response.
reviewer2840445 - PeerSpot reviewer
Data Engineering Senior Specialist at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Data lineage and quality checks have streamlined team-wide collaboration and business context
The biggest friction point or frustration I have encountered with Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is cost-wise it is acceptable, but sometimes unexpected errors will occur, though this happens very rarely. There are features I wish Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance had that it does not provide today. Enterprise-level lineage is one such feature. As of now, if Microsoft were to provide this tool for free when you buy Microsoft Fabric, I feel that would be better. This would also result in lower license costs. I do not have any changes I would make to Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance at this time.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We use AD Connect to sync on-premises AD to Azure AD, and so far, it has been effective."
"Microsoft Defender for Identity helps me automate routine tasks and find alerts that I set up to receive, so it helps me get where I'm trying to go easier and faster."
"The integration into the Microsoft Defender ecosystem is the most valuable feature of Microsoft Defender for Identity."
"The feature I like most is that you can create your own customized detection rules. It has a lot of default alerts and rules, but you can customize them according to your business needs."
"The most valuable aspect is its connection to Microsoft Sentinel and Defender for Endpoint, and giving exact timelines for incidents and when certain events occured during an incident."
"The most valuable feature is its hybrid artificial intelligence, which gathers forensic data to track and counteract security threats, much like the CSI series in effect."
"Microsoft is a big company."
"The feature I like the most about Defender for Identity is the entity tags. They give you the ability to identify sensitive accounts, devices, and groups. You also have honeytoken entities, which are devices that are identified as "bait" for fraudulent actors."
"Customer support is excellent."
"The time it saves is very useful."
"The features I appreciate the most in Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance include the ability to build cases, give them dates, and find them based on the notes that I left behind."
"Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance helps with extra collaboration and ensures communication is within the framework."
"Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance has impacted my organization positively; it is a good tool that provides an end-to-end business view for a particular organization."
 

Cons

"The solution should provide more detailed data regarding anomaly detections."
"One potential area for improvement could be exploring flexibility in the installation of Microsoft Defender for Identity agents."
"An area for improvement is the administrative interface. It's basic compared to other administrative centers. They could make it more user-friendly and easier to navigate."
"One improvement I would recommend is the integration of an admin application within Teams, allowing easy access to attack information on a mobile platform to promptly alert affected users and their friends."
"Microsoft should look at what competing vendors like CrowdStrike and Broadcom are doing and incorporate those features into Sentinel and Defender. At the same time, I think the intelligence inside the product is improving fast. They should incorporate more zero-trust and hybrid trust approaches. They need to build up threat intelligence based on threats and methods used in attacks on other companies."
"Defender for Identity gives us visibility, but we often get false positives from Azure that take us down the garden path. We go through 30 incidents each day and most of those are false positives or benign positive alerts. Occasionally, we get true positive alerts."
"The solution could be better at using group-managed access and they could replace it with broad-based access controls."
"The areas of Microsoft Defender for Identity that can be improved include its cost, which is quite expensive when integrated into Sentinel. Additionally, there is room for improvement in its integration with non-Microsoft applications and systems."
"The product should incorporate more automation with the help of AI."
"Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance can be improved by having more tutorials available for those who aren't used to using this platform."
"Monitoring and compliance for web applications could be improved."
"The biggest friction point or frustration I have encountered with Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is cost-wise it is acceptable, but sometimes unexpected errors will occur, though this happens very rarely."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is very affordable considering that other SIEM solutions are much more expensive and have many more licensing restrictions and fees."
"Defender for Identity is a little more expensive than other Microsoft products. Identity and Microsoft Defender for Cloud are both a bit costly."
"You won't be able to change your tenants from where you deploy them. For example, if you select Canada, they will charge you based on Canadian pricing. If you are also in London, when you deploy in Canada, the pound is higher than Canadian dollars, but your platform resources are billable in Canadian dollars. Using your pounds to pay for any of these things will be cheaper. Or, if you deploy in London, they will charge you based on your local currency."
"The product is costly, and we had multiple discussions with accounting to receive a discounted rate. However, on the open market, the tool is expensive."
"Microsoft Defender for Identity comes as part of the Microsoft E5 licensing stack."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise15
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Identity?
I really would have to sit down to think about how Microsoft Defender for Identity can be improved. I didn't take stock in what needs to be improved because I appreciated having the tools right the...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Defender for Identity?
My main use cases for Microsoft Defender for Identity include Conditional Access, checking risky users, remediating risky users, and user sign-ins. I can easily remediate or determine what the user...
What advice do you have for others considering Microsoft Defender for Identity?
I don't really use Microsoft Defender for Identity a lot because my new role doesn't allow me to take time to do so. I don't really use the threat intelligence feature of Microsoft Defender for Ide...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance?
The biggest friction point or frustration I have encountered with Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is cost-wise it is acceptable, but sometimes unexpected errors will occur, though this h...
What advice do you have for others considering Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance?
The scope of Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is a team-wide workflow. The first thing I do when I open Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is check how many workspaces are availab...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance?
Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance is a bit expensive, $500 per license, but it is cheaper compared to products like ComplyAd, GeoComply, and ComplyAdvantage.
 

Also Known As

Azure Advanced Threat Protection, Azure ATP, MS Defender for Identity
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Identity is trusted by companies such as St. Luke’s University Health Network, Ansell, and more.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Identity vs. Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.