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

Microsoft Entra ID vs Symantec Siteminder comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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

Microsoft Entra ID
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
1st
Ranking in Access Management
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
276
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (1st), Identity Management (IM) (2nd), Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (2nd)
Symantec Siteminder
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
13th
Ranking in Access Management
12th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
75
Ranking in other categories
Web Access Management (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Entra ID is 9.8%, down from 26.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Siteminder is 3.0%, up from 2.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Entra ID9.8%
Symantec Siteminder3.0%
Other87.2%
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

Featured Reviews

Stafin Jacob - PeerSpot reviewer
Microsoft 365 Security & Compliance Practice Lead at Invoke
Identity has become our central gatekeeper and has provided secure single sign-on for all users
Microsoft Entra ID can improve by focusing more on new passwordless methods and becoming a primary adopter. One feature we would like to see is the ability to have security questions for password resets. I know the current capability is phasing out, so we do not have an alternative method yet. Customers who already use security questions require a smoother transition for that capability to be available. My experience with the deployment has had some challenges, particularly around the Microsoft MFA campaigns. The hardest part is moving users from a different MFA provider to the Microsoft MFA provider, as it ultimately depends on user activity. In large enterprises with numerous users across various geographies, this transition takes time. If there are ways to exert more control around that process, it would improve the situation.
Muzi Lubisi - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior technical Consultant at CA Africa
Improved user experience with seamless integration and easy installation
The feature that I mostly valued is the ease of installation on different systems, especially on Windows. Additionally, it is very beneficial for deploying single sign-on sessions between different windows on a web browser, provided I am connected to the right identity provider. That seamless integration significantly improves user experience and efficiency.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The ability to grant access to other organizations is helpful."
"Entra has made it easy to manage identity and access by integrating with all Microsoft services."
"Privileged Identity Management and Privileged Identity Management make controlling access considerably easier and ensure that authorized access is achieved."
"The ability to offer employees access to any platform, including private PCs and tablets, has been a game-changer."
"Microsoft Entra ID has helped the company with user identities, user device management, and endpoint management."
"Microsoft Entra ID provides granular role assignments for Azure permissions or Azure AD roles. Using a privileged identity manager allows us to give specific access to certain groups of employees for a limited time. Entra's ability to integrate Azure Virtual Machines and security benefits has been exceptional, especially for managing infrastructure and applications."
"Conditional access and Privileged Identity Management (PIM) are the most valuable features from a security perspective."
"Azure Active Directory has improved our organization because it is one of the key components and is being used by almost most companies for identifying and access management on the cloud or on-premise infrastructure."
"Once we have our authentication and authorization policies set, they are easy to duplicate across all our applications instead of trying to develop them into each application individually."
"The most valuable feature is the Federation part of Single Sign On, which is customizable and is easily integrated with any customer application or any third party application."
"It's really increased the security of our applications, and in some cases, has provided much more security."
"Single Sign-On is the number one feature of SiteMinder that we're using."
"CA SSO is helping us a lot in providing the access solution to the customers."
"The product greatly facilitates a centralized identity and access management system."
"It has improved our user experience quite a bit because they can log in once and go to any application they want, as long as it is integrated with SiteMinder, which was not the case before."
"If you look at our organization, and really all financial institutions, we have a lot of legacy apps. So it really helps to get Single Sign-On."
 

Cons

"I would rate my customer service and technical support as about a five right now, as we just got in contact with our Microsoft rep, so it is improving."
"Something that can be improved is their user interface"
"I had some issues with the Azure Active Directory on Windows XP."
"The issue with Microsoft Customer Service is that we have many experts in our IT department, including myself as an Entra expert, Exchange experts, and other specialists. When we contact Microsoft Support, it does not matter that we are experts; we must start at the very bottom."
"They can simplify and provide more information about adding or updating a phone number or email id in the MSA account."
"The product takes at least ten minutes to activate privilege identity management roles."
"I would rate their technical support a six out of ten. It requires starting at the bottom and working our way up, which is time-consuming."
"When implementing for one client, where they had ADFS turned on, we could not ID enough ADFS and when there was no internet connection. This was a Catch-22 for us, and very frustrating."
"In future releases, I would like to see maybe more capabilities with some more modern authentication."
"The maintenance cost has increased significantly, and we are concerned about this."
"While I have some integration with a few major providers, support for more would be advantageous."
"The tech support has not been very good for us so we don't use them anymore."
"The technical support could be better."
"The problem is we need the support, but they don't know anything about the product."
"It's stable, but we are finding some compatibility issues."
"I will say the user interface for login is kind of plain. They could make it a little prettier."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If you have a different IDP today, I would take a close look at what your licensing looks like, then reevaluate the licensing that you have with Microsoft 365, and see if you're covered for some of this other stuff. Folks sometimes don't realize that, "Oh, I'm licensed for that service in Azure." This becomes one of those situations where you have the "aha" moment, "Oh, I didn't know we can do that. Alright, let's go down this road." Then, they start to have conversations with Microsoft to see what they can gain. I would recommend that they work closely with their TAM, just to make sure that they are getting the right level of service. They may just not be aware of what is available to them."
"For you to make use of some of the security features, you need to upgrade your licenses. If it is possible, could they just make some features free? For instance, for the Condition Access policy, you need to set that up and be on Azure AD P2 licensing. So if they could make it free or reduce the licensing for small businesses, that would be cool, as I believe security is for everyone."
"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."
"We make sure that we only enable the licenses that are needed for the users, rather than enabling licenses in a blanket fashion."
"Be sure: You know your userbase, e.g., how many users you have. You choose the right license and model that suit your business requirements."
"We are always looking for better pricing."
"It's pretty good. We're using the native features. It's bundled with our Office 365 licenses. We aren't paying anything extra for Azure Active Directory. It's pretty good for us because it's complementary to Office 365. We're only paying for Office 365."
"Licensing fees are paid monthly."
"I recommend conducting a PoC on every available product before choose one."
"CA solutions are generally expensive but for the customer the ROI is big."
"The solution's pricing is competitive."
"The licensing is fair for this solution."
"Siteminder is a little costly. You pay for licensing, and they offer packages, so if you have less users, then you have to buy different products at different prices. If you have more of a user base, then the package is different. They also include other features—for example, if you have a database and you're using Siteminder, then it's good to use a Semantic-specific database, but if you are using less, then you have to purchase the database separately. Whereas if you are going for a bigger license, then it comes within the package. It depends on which plan you are using."
"The price is quite comparable to the other enterprise-level solutions in that market."
"Symantec Siteminder is expensive; they could definitely do better on the price."
"The pricing is reasonable."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Single Sign-On (SSO) solutions are best for your needs.
893,244 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
24%
Insurance Company
8%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
Performing Arts
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business90
Midsize Enterprise41
Large Enterprise160
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise69
 

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...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Active Directory?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that going through and being able to use these things is always part of delivering an M365 bundle, so I don't think the experience is great ...
What needs improvement with Azure Active Directory?
Microsoft Entra ID can be improved by open-sourcing it. You already have Windows Subsystem for Linux, which is open-source Linux in Microsoft. One major shift for Microsoft would be using the commo...
What needs improvement with Symantec Siteminder?
Symantec Siteminder needs to have adaptive authentication and multi-factor authentication as integrated features. Currently, multi-factor authentication is available as a separate solution, and it ...
What is your primary use case for Symantec Siteminder?
I deploy and support Symantec Siteminder ( /products/symantec-siteminder-reviews ). I have been a partner and reseller.
 

Also Known As

Azure AD, Azure Active Directory, Azure Active Directory, Microsoft Authenticator
SiteMinder, CA SSO, Layer7 SiteMinder
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Entre ID is trusted by companies of all sizes and industries including Walmart, Zscaler, Uniper, Amtrak, monday.com, and more.
British Telecom, CoreBlox, DBS, HMS, Itera ASA and Simeo
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Entra ID vs. Symantec Siteminder and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,244 professionals have used our research since 2012.