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Microsoft Entra ID vs Symantec Siteminder comparison

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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)
2nd
Ranking in Access Management
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
278
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (1st), Identity Management (IM) (3rd), 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
15th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
75
Ranking in other categories
Web Access Management (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Entra ID is 8.4%, down from 16.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Siteminder is 3.7%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Entra ID8.4%
Symantec Siteminder3.7%
Other87.9%
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

"User and device management is the most valuable feature."
"It is one of the hybrid solutions that can be used the most to establish an entity configuration in multiple environments."
"Azure AD can grow as required and since it is PaaS you don't need to worry about provisioning more hardware to keep performance up."
"Scalability has been the biggest benefit."
"The solution offers business to business and client to business support."
"The visibility and control for permission management are excellent."
"The single sign-on is the most valuable aspect of the solution."
"Using Azure Active Directory has benefitted several of my clients, with an example being a startup organization."
"It is reliable."
"Once it works, it works really well."
"CA SSO is helping us a lot in providing the access solution to the customers."
"The security and single sign-on (SSO) features are the most valuable."
"The most valuable feature is the flexibility of this product to integrate with any third-party components and platforms."
"It's quite scalable."
"The product greatly facilitates a centralized identity and access management system."
"Symantec Siteminder Is both scalable and stable."
 

Cons

"Microsoft's technical support needs to be improved. It's a bit bureaucratic, to put it in one word."
"The transition from on-prem Active Directory to the Azure Cloud was difficult because there aren't group policy objectives. This is handled differently in the Azure cloud environment."
"To improve Microsoft Entra ID, I think on the left navigation bar when you actually open Entra, there is a button that you need to click to make every option available for that tab open, so you always need to click that button, which is an arrow facing upward and an arrow facing downward."
"The thing that is a bit annoying is the inability to nest groups."
"We have just recently started implementing write-back caching. We were able to go from AD to cloud, but we were not going from cloud back down to AD."
"Generally, everything works pretty well, but sometimes, Azure Active Directory has outages on the Microsoft side of things. These outages really have a very big impact on the users, applications, and everything else because they are closely tied to the Azure AD ecosystem. So, whenever there is an outage, it is really difficult because all things start failing. This happens very rarely, but when it happens, there is a big impact."
"The pricing is okay, however, it could always be better in the future."
"I would like it if Intune could manage MacOS or iOS directly. Right now, we have to use a third-party solution."
"While I have some integration with a few major providers, support for more would be advantageous."
"We are finding some compatibility issues. We're still working with CA on them."
"I would like to see more usability; more customer usability."
"The main thing is we do not have the traceability and good monitoring that CA can provide us to capture problems when they occur."
"The maintenance cost has increased significantly, and we are concerned about this."
"I'd like to see a rework of the user directory configuration."
"When the client approaches CA, it provides an answer that is more product-oriented, rather than solution-oriented, so there is a communication gap."
"I think they need to integrate some of the newer types of authentication into the product. I'm not seeing the innovation when it comes to biometrics in the product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Azure AD comes with Office 365, so we are just paying for the Office 365 license."
"We have various levels of their licensing, which includes users on different levels of their enterprise offering."
"Licensing is easy."
"The solution costs us 60,000 Rupees annually, just over $700, and there are no additional costs."
"Make sure that you get the most out of your Office 365 licenses for Azure AD. If you have additional concerns for users who don't have an Office 365 license, consider Azure AD Premium P1 and P2. Be aware that you have to evaluate your license usage beforehand."
"The licensing costs are yearly. There is a standard fee per user."
"Licensing fees are paid on a monthly basis and the cost depends on the number of users."
"The process for buying licenses from Microsoft is somewhat messy and really hard to do. We have to talk to someone because it's hard to find out how many licenses we need. If I'm applying for 2,000 users, how many Windows licenses do we need? They could also charge less for support."
"The licensing is fair for this solution."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"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 solution's pricing is competitive."
"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."
"CA solutions are generally expensive but for the customer the ROI is big."
"I recommend conducting a PoC on every available product before choose one."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Outsourcing Company
14%
Construction Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business91
Midsize Enterprise42
Large Enterprise162
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?
I primarily use Microsoft Entra ID's free tier, so I have not faced any issues with pricing; I hope this free tier remains available for some time.
What needs improvement with Azure Active Directory?
To improve Microsoft Entra ID, I believe it should be openable with third-party applications to use Microsoft Authenticator, which is currently tied to Entra. There should definitely be a way to re...
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: October 2026.
920,929 professionals have used our research since 2012.