Microsoft Entra ID vs Microsoft Purview Audit comparison

Microsoft Entra ID and Microsoft Purview Audit are both solutions in the Microsoft Security Suite category. Microsoft Entra ID is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.6, while Microsoft Purview Audit is ranked #31 with an average rating of 8.0. Microsoft Entra ID holds a 7.7% mindshare in Microsoft Security Suite, compared to Microsoft Purview Audit’s 1.2% mindshare. Additionally, 95% of Microsoft Entra ID users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Microsoft Purview Audit users who would recommend it.

Microsoft Entra ID

Read 266 Microsoft Entra ID reviews

24,265 Views
3,640 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

Microsoft Purview Audit

Read 4 Microsoft Purview Audit reviews

1,184 Views
320 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Microsoft Entra ID

Microsoft Purview Audit

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Microsoft Entra ID and Microsoft Purview Audit based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Microsoft Security Suite solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed Microsoft Entra ID vs. Microsoft Purview Audit Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Entra ID vs. Microsoft Purview Audit

December 2025

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Helped 881,082 peers since 2012

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 Entra ID

Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite

2nd

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

266

Ranking in other categories

Single Sign-On (SSO) (1st), Authentication Systems (1st), Identity Management (IM) (2nd), Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (1st), Access Management (1st)

Microsoft Purview Audit

Ranking in Microsoft Security Suite

31st

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

5.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Log Management (35th)

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Microsoft Security Suite category, the mindshare of Microsoft Entra ID is 7.7%, down from 8.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Purview Audit is 1.2%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Microsoft Security Suite Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Microsoft Entra ID	7.7%
Microsoft Purview Audit	1.2%
Other	91.1%

Microsoft Security Suite

Featured Reviews

Dewey Phillips

Senior Information Security Engineer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees

Implementing seamless integration boosts secure access and supports Zero Trust

What I appreciate the most about Microsoft Entra ID is that it integrates seamlessly with all the Defender products and is easy to use. Microsoft Entra ID's integration capabilities influence our Zero Trust model by allowing us to enforce our Zero Trust model. Conditional access policies allow us to leverage Microsoft Entra ID to verify that devices signing in to our cloud services are coming from registered devices, and that people are passing all the other requirements we have in order to complete sign-on or conditional access policies. Since implementing Microsoft Entra ID, I've observed changes in the frequency and nature of identity-related security incidents. The organization already had it implemented when I arrived, and I've been working to enhance it. Better configuration of Microsoft Entra ID has allowed us to better protect our organization from threats. Having it alone isn't a solution, but ensuring proper configuration goes a long way in preventing future compromises. My company's approach to defending against token theft and nation-state attacks has evolved since implementing Microsoft Entra ID. We haven't experienced any known compromises from nation-state attacks, and implementing newer features gives me more confidence in our protection. Regarding device-bound passkeys in Microsoft Authenticator and our approach to phishing-resistant authentication, we are currently implementing Microsoft Entra ID certificate-based authentication. Adding a strong form of MFA is important as we found it to be the most cost-effective way. While other solutions might be equally or more secure, they are significantly more expensive. Having worked as an IT consultant mainly with the Microsoft stack across various industries, I have experience with different identity management solutions. Microsoft Entra ID remains the best option. The major advantages when comparing it to Okta include integration with Defender products, Defender for Identities' integration with conditional access policies, and insider threat management integration for blocking sign-ins based on risk factors. The enhancement of Microsoft Entra ID's implementation is relatively straightforward. My main concern is the occasional lack of documentation and the frequency of changes, which can make feature location challenging.

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Oksana Kosukhina.

Cloud Solution Engineer at a computer software company with 51-200 employees

Integrated auditing has strengthened data retention and improved incident investigations

I have seen areas for improvement, specifically in Microsoft Purview Audit or in general about Microsoft. I have had a situation with documentation. I had a customer who wanted to create alerts and they had Microsoft 365 Business Premium. In the documentation, it was noted that this license is enough for creating alerts. When we tried to make them, we noticed they cannot do it with Microsoft 365 E3 because the customer had limited features to manage alerts. The customer had to buy E3. We created Microsoft support requests, and they confirmed that the documentation displayed not the real situation and they have been going to update documentation. The same situation occurred now with implementing Microsoft Purview Audit in the last autumn. eDiscovery was combined with search and content search, and the documentation was not clear at the beginning. It was a little difficult to describe to customers that now it is a part of eDiscovery. Content search is a very simple functionality, while eDiscovery is a little difficult. I am not entirely sure why Microsoft is going in the way of combining these services because they are the same. However, for a customer who has never seen these services, it is difficult to understand quickly. The same situation occurs with litigation holds and some other holds. For any mail, I am trying to keep data. For example, emails are held for a year or two years, ten years, it does not matter. It is difficult to understand where to find this data and where these emails are being held. I need to use eDiscovery to find out all deleted data that was kept somewhere in some hidden folders of the mailbox. Regular customers and regular administrators know that on-premises Exchange, for example, allows them to find the data in some repository and review the list of kept data. However, with this hold, we do not have any functionality to review the list of kept data. It is difficult to understand for customers how to work with this. I had a case where I spent three or four hours working deeply with a customer to explain how to work with eDiscovery, why Content Search is not there when it was before, what is an eDiscovery case, and why we are talking about all of this just to review a list of kept emails. This is difficult.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"In a lot of situations, it is easy and free or almost free to use Microsoft Entra MFA."

"Conditional Access is a helpful feature because it allows us to provide better security for our users."

"The fact that we ended up expanding it to AWS as well for single sign-on was because it's this kind of industry standard that every single sign-on solution supports."

"A use case that we did for an end user in a manufacturing organization: We used WVD with biometric authentication because 1,500 processes need to happen in a process. The user didn't want to use a login using their credentials. They wanted to use fingerprinting or tap their ID. That is where we integrated with the authentication. Now, they can process in a couple of hours, and they run those 1,500 processes every day. This changed their login process, which improved the manufacturing process. This helped a lot for their high deployment."

"It enhanced our end user experience quite a bit. Instead of the days of having to contact the service desk with challenges for choosing their password, users can go in and do it themselves locally, regardless of where they are in the world. This has certainly made it a better experience accessing their applications. Previously, a lot of times, they had to remember multiple usernames and passwords for different systems. This solution brings it all together, using a single sign-on experience."

"Azure AD allowed us to get rid of servers and other hardware running at our offices. We moved everything to the cloud. Once we set up roles and permissions, it's only a matter of adding people and removing people from different groups and letting permissions flow through."

"My two preferred features are conditional access and privileged identity management."

"It is cloud based so it is always updated,"

More Microsoft Entra ID pros

"We're easily saving at least one hour per day using this solution."

"The platform has significantly enhanced our operational insight into the overall Microsoft 365 environment."

"The overall user experience with Microsoft Purview Audit is of higher quality than when it was branded as Compliance Center, and Microsoft consistently updates and evolves functionalities and the overall experience."

"The main Microsoft feature is that it offers common integration of services, of data, of identity, meaning user accounts, user access, and privileged access."

Cons

"The B2B Federation functionality is not perfect and could be improved. It is not on the same level that we could have if it were being used on-premises. It offers a different experience, which is a bit complicated and has some additional drawbacks."

"The only improvement would be for everything to be instant in terms of applying changes and propagating them to systems."

"Microsoft's biggest challenge is the documentation. The challenge lies in keeping documentation up-to-date due to rapid changes. Troubleshooting requires workarounds and research."

"The management interface has some areas that need improvement."

"The product needs to be more user-friendly."

"The scalability of the solution is good."

"The workflow management for registering new applications and users could be improved."

"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."

More Microsoft Entra ID cons

"We do have a Denial of Access happening."

"We are still in the early stages of leveraging Microsoft Purview Audit. Currently, it's primarily used for the audit function."

"I had a case where I spent three or four hours working deeply with a customer to explain how to work with eDiscovery, why Content Search is not there when it was before, what is an eDiscovery case, and why we are talking about all of this just to review a list of kept emails."

"Areas for product improvement include enhancing customization options and integrating more comprehensive compliance features."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Compared to other Microsoft products, the cost is not too expensive. There's a free tier available, though it doesn't include all features. Overall, it's well-priced."

"The licensing model is straightforward. I don't think there are any issues with the E3 license or E5 license."

"Licensing costs for Microsoft Entra ID remain a concern, especially with the price increases in 2023."

"Microsoft is so expensive. You know it is expensive when a Fortune 100 company like ours is complaining about the cost. That has been a big thing for me. When I really want to use an Azure service, it is very hard for me to justify the cost, especially with Microsoft support."

"The solution costs us 60,000 Rupees annually, just over $700, and there are no additional costs."

"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."

"The basic tier of Azure Active Directory is free, so many users use the service for free. For a small company having the security and compliance that Azure offers is a great benefit. For small companies that are using the basic services, not having to pay for Azure Active Directory is the main asset because they can manage their users and have authentications tools and security."

"As a nonprofit, we have A5 licenses for nonprofits in education, so we at least have some reduced costs."

More Microsoft Entra ID pricing and cost advice

Information not available

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	85
Midsize Enterprise	38
Large Enterprise	155

No data available

Questions from the Community

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 Duo for 30 days, and we could not be happier. Duo Security is easy to configure a...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Active Directory?

My experience with the pricing, setup costs, and licensing of Microsoft Entra ID is that it is decent.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Azure Active Directory?

I think Microsoft Entra ID could be improved by assigning permissions to nested groups in the next release.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Purview Audit?

I'm not aware of the pricing of licensing terms.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Microsoft Purview Audit?

We are still in the early stages of leveraging Microsoft Purview Audit. Currently, it's primarily used for the audit function. In a year's time, we will be able to provide more clarity and context ...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Microsoft Purview Audit?

Microsoft Purview Audit functions as a compliance center. Whenever these systems generate logs, we use Microsoft Purview Audit to capture or retrieve those logs. While there are more tools availabl...

See all answers

Comparisons

Google Cloud Identity vs Microsoft Entra ID

Compared 24% of the time

Microsoft Intune vs Microsoft Entra ID

Compared 5% of the time

Okta Platform vs Microsoft Entra ID

Compared 4% of the time

SailPoint Identity Security Cloud vs Microsoft Entra ID

Compared 4% of the time

Amazon Cognito vs Microsoft Entra ID

Compared 3% of the time

More Microsoft Entra ID Competitors

Sumo Logic Security vs Microsoft Purview Audit

Compared 9% of the time

SolarWinds Kiwi Syslog Server vs Microsoft Purview Audit

Compared 9% of the time

Microsoft Purview eDiscovery vs Microsoft Purview Audit

Compared 8% of the time

Splunk Enterprise Security vs Microsoft Purview Audit

Compared 7% of the time

Splunk Cloud Platform vs Microsoft Purview Audit

Compared 7% of the time

More Microsoft Purview Audit Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Entra ID

January 2026

Download Microsoft Entra ID product report

Buyer's Guide

Log Management

January 2026

Download Microsoft Purview Audit product report

Also Known As

Azure AD, Azure Active Directory, Azure Active Directory, Microsoft Authenticator

No data available

Interactive Demo

Microsoft

Demo not available

Microsoft

Overview

Microsoft Entra ID is an advanced identity and access management service offering seamless single sign-on, multifactor authentication, and centralized user access across applications, enhancing security and efficiency for organizations transitioning to cloud-based environments.

Recognized for its centralized management, Microsoft Entra ID significantly boosts organizational security by integrating features such as conditional access and identity protection. It supports a wide array of applications, facilitating a secure transition from on-premises to scalable cloud environments. By adopting robust security measures and flexible identity management, organizations can streamline operations and ensure consistent user experiences. However, challenges like confusing licensing costs, outdated documentation, and limited integration with non-Microsoft applications persist. Enhancements in technical support, interface design, and more granular permissions are needed to address these issues effectively.

What are the key features of Microsoft Entra ID?

Seamless Single Sign-On: Allows users to access multiple applications with one set of credentials.
Multifactor Authentication: Adds an extra layer of security by requiring multiple forms of verification.
Conditional Access: Provides adaptive policies to ensure the right access under the right conditions.
Identity Protection: Detects and responds to potential vulnerabilities and threats.
Privileged Identity Management: Controls and monitors access to critical resources.

What benefits should users expect when evaluating Microsoft Entra ID?

Enhanced Security: Protects against unauthorized access and data breaches.
Operational Efficiency: Centralizes identity management to reduce administrative tasks.
Scalability: Supports growth by accommodating evolving IT environments.
Cost Management: Facilitates cost control through centralized systems and automated processes.

In healthcare, Microsoft Entra ID facilitates secure patient record access and compliance with industry regulations. Financial institutions rely on it for robust security measures in safeguarding client data. In the education sector, it streamlines access to online resources for students and faculty. Global enterprises benefit from its ability to manage complex identity frameworks across multiple regions, ensuring reliable security amidst increasing cyber threats.

Microsoft

The unified auditing functionality in Microsoft 365 provides organizations with visibility into many types of audited activities across many different services in Microsoft 365. Advanced Audit helps organizations to conduct forensic and compliance investigations by increasing audit log retention required to conduct an investigation, providing access to crucial events that help determine scope of compromise, and faster access to Office 365 Management Activity API.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Microsoft Entre ID is trusted by companies of all sizes and industries including Walmart, Zscaler, Uniper, Amtrak, monday.com, and more.

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Entra ID vs. Microsoft Purview Audit

December 2025

Free Report: Microsoft Entra ID vs. Microsoft Purview Audit

Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Entra ID vs. Microsoft Purview Audit and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.

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