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Okta Platform vs Symantec Siteminder comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 22, 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

Okta Platform
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
1st
Ranking in Access Management
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
127
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (3rd), Privileged Access Management (PAM) (3rd), Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (2nd), ZTNA as a Service (3rd), Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM) (1st), AI IT Support (1st)
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 Okta Platform is 10.9%, up from 8.3% 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 (%)
Okta Platform10.9%
Symantec Siteminder3.7%
Other85.4%
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

Featured Reviews

SN
Identity and Access Management Specialist at a university with 10,001+ employees
Automated lifecycle management has cut onboarding times and now drives secure, clean access
Although I am a fan of Okta Platform overall, there are areas where it could improve security outcomes and reduce admin friction. My top improvement areas include the system log and analytics upgrade, which are great for point troubleshooting, but trending and root cause analysis across large tenants still require exporting to SIEM. Verbose queries and long-range retention costs can add up. Additionally, while certificate rotations are better than most, the process is still manual for busy portfolios, especially concerning multi-SP SAML certificate rotations and app metadata drift. Two more buckets of potential improvements for Okta Platform involve user experience and security. There is the issue of push fatigue and prompt sprawl, where users receive multiple prompts across different apps and sessions. I arrived at the rating of eight because the core controls are strong and reliable, but a few operational UX and UI gaps prevent it from being rated higher. The reasons for not giving it a nine or ten include ongoing issues concerning safety and change safety, the complexity of group rules and mappings, and the lack of robustness in policy management. Additionally, there remains a need for more manual involvement than necessary, especially for large portfolios and dual certificate rotation, along with proactive SP data metadata validation.
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

"Workforce Identity's best features include its user-friendliness and easy setup."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"The end user's ease of use is the most valuable feature."
"Okta Platform has impacted my organization positively by providing convenience, first of all, because there are no more different passwords for many different apps, security has also improved because we eliminate a very big weak point that passwords represent, and we maintain control to ensure we only give access to the necessary apps to the necessary people."
"Okta Platform has positively impacted my organization by doing a lot of cleanup, simplifying operations, improving visibility, governance, and security across the board."
"Okta Workforce Identity is reliable, and its user experience and user interface are great."
"It is flexible and easy to install."
"I can say it is more secure, more user-friendly, and integration with applications is easier."
"It provides the breadth and the width to provide solutions for the different kinds of technologies which we have."
"SAML is the best thing we're using right now because there is no need for creating an external account."
"The most valuable feature is that it meets the requirements of the customer. You have a lot of features in the product. Every product has them, but the question is, are these products going to meet the requirement of the customer?"
"SSO affords us the opportunity to have a federated connection between our members, groups, and companies, giving providers the ability to transpose across the different Delta Dentals without having to authenticate more than once with one identity for all sites."
"The solution is easy to use for our managers."
"It's definitely a good product and you won't go wrong if you choose this product."
"This solution is meeting our requirements for all of our applications."
"It's quite scalable."
 

Cons

"For enterprises which really prefer to have their own identity within their own perimeter, Okta Platform might not be the solution they might look for."
"When I started, there were some UI challenges. The UI could be improved to make it better because I had to watch many tutorials to become familiar with their UI flow and integrations."
"Okta can consider to become also a password vaulting manager."
"There should be automated aggregation and complete classification processes included in it."
"Initial technical support is not very responsive, it's only after escalation that we get proper support."
"My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Okta Platform is that it is expensive and complicated."
"The only aspect in which it can be improved is that the interface could be cleaner. I found this even when I was trying to do my certification exam because the certification is hands-on. You find yourself fumbling around a little bit to find simple things. This happens even when you start to get familiar with the product."
"I would appreciate it if Okta Workforce Identity becomes more user-friendly. Its API technology is complicated. Certain applications may pose challenges in terms of integration, especially when they require IDP technologies that aren't easily codable. While I can't provide specific examples, some applications may not integrate with Okta Workforce Identity."
"I'd like to see the federation piece made a little simpler."
"Although the policy server has sometimes spontaneously restarted, it’s mostly good."
"Yes it can be complex, I think that's one area we have already given feedback to the product management, that is a little complex to get the set up and get it going and the upgrade process is very complex."
"The performance could be better. The support could be faster."
"Once you get past the first level, it’s good support. Typically once you’ve supported the CA product for a couple of years, you probably know more than first-level support, so it’s frustrating to explain to them the issue."
"Some of the features need to be improved. For example, the Federation feature."
"Sometimes technical support is slow to respond, and that’s typical."
"We have challenges, performance issues for which we’re unable to find the root cause as we scale."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Though I don't know about the licensing model of the product, I wouldn't be surprised if Okta offers a per user license subscription model."
"Workforce Identity is well-priced."
"The cost per user for this solution is really high and could be reduced."
"This solution is costly. Pricing is decent if you have less users, but it significantly goes up the more users you have, with its cost not justified."
"The product is expensive compared to other vendors."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"Okta Customer Identity is not an expensive solution."
"The price of the solution is good."
"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 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."
"CA solutions are generally expensive but for the customer the ROI is big."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"I recommend conducting a PoC on every available product before choose one."
"The solution's pricing is competitive."
report
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
8%
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 Business53
Midsize Enterprise27
Large Enterprise65
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise69
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Okta Workforce Identity?
Pricing for Okta is reasonably not that much, however, I don't have access to the commercial aspect.
What needs improvement with Okta Workforce Identity?
Currently, in Okta Workforce Identity we get the two-digit authentication code. Instead of getting the two-digit authentication code, if we had an option to do fingerprint verification, that would ...
What is your primary use case for Okta Workforce Identity?
I don't have many details about Okta Workforce Identity. I use the tool just to sign in to different applications that we have. We basically set up Okta Workforce Identity in our mobile phone. We d...
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

Okta Customer Identity, Workforce Identity
SiteMinder, CA SSO, Layer7 SiteMinder
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

FedEx, Zoom, Takeda, Lululemon Athletica, GrunHub, jetBlue, McKensson, Bain & Company, Engie, Peloton, Sonos, T-Mobile, Hewlett Packard, MGM Resorts, Ally Financial, Priceline, Albertsons, Itercom, Classy, FICO, Kensho, Live Nation, Drata, Rotary, and others.
British Telecom, CoreBlox, DBS, HMS, Itera ASA and Simeo
Find out what your peers are saying about Okta Platform vs. Symantec Siteminder and other solutions. Updated: October 2026.
920,939 professionals have used our research since 2012.