In our environment, we have managed Linux servers, cloud resources, and production systems, and we use StrongDM as a privileged access management solution. StrongDM authenticates users through the identity provider, authorizes access based on RBAC, and establishes secure SSH connections. We also maintain complete audit logs of all user activities. For example, if our team needs to access an app server, DB server, or a Kubernetes cluster, instead of using SSH user@server, we first authenticate them through StrongDM. Then, StrongDM checks if the user is active and belongs to the cloud operations team, and if they have production access. If the criteria are met, StrongDM creates the security connection for them. Once the security connection is established, the cloud engineer logs in to the StrongDM portal, it performs SSO authentication, and the role is verified. Then, they are redirected to the StrongDM gateway, and the person can connect. No passwords need to be shared. Regarding the workflow, suppose there is an incident. Without StrongDM, we would have to find the key and then SSH to the production VM, which would take several minutes. With StrongDM, we go to the StrongDM portal, select the production VM, connect, and start troubleshooting. This saves time. The focus shifts from managing access to solving the incident within a few minutes. Regarding the audit process, everything will be recorded in StrongDM. The administrator knows who connected, which resource was accessed, and for how long they were active. We can get all of this information from the complete audit logs.
Solution Delivery Advisor at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Top 20
Jul 14, 2026
My main use case for StrongDM is to assess identity and authentication and authorization access control reviews. When I conduct internal audits or assessments to check the presence of security controls, I use StrongDM to navigate to the configuration settings panel to check what flags and features are enabled or disabled. I appreciate the UI of the overall tool and its functionality. There was a situation where I had to check whether the privileged account credentials maintained in StrongDM PAM tool are actually encrypted. I configured and opened StrongDM and checked the settings in the configuration window where I was able to verify that StrongDM contains controls and features which enable it to encrypt privileged account credentials. Additionally, it has features for auditing, generating audit trails, and log trails for all activities conducted by any user who is using privileged accounts. Apart from that, there is a database active monitoring tool embedded within StrongDM. These are certain cases where I have navigated this tool and found the UI to be very user-friendly.
Associate Software Engineer at a computer software company with 201-500 employees
Real User
Top 5
Jun 16, 2026
My main use case for StrongDM is to provide access to database credentials. I wanted to give users access to the database and also to the applications that I have built for testing. Providing privileged access to users through StrongDM is the core use case I implemented.
My main use case for StrongDM is privileged access management and infrastructure access that we cater to, as we were looking for alternatives and solutions to securely control and monitor our access to servers. We have been using different kinds of Kubernetes clusters, databases, cloud infrastructure, and internal applications. Instead of giving direct access to our employees, the idea was a VPN-heavy access with shared keys for better usage. This is how I used it during my Kafka experience about three years ago, and also in my current team at GitLab. In one of those scenarios, my experience with StrongDM while working with Kubernetes in the Kafka team illustrates how we were initially looking for a better way to manage secure access to our infrastructure. Our teams scaled across different environments and regions, primarily Europe, including Sweden and India. Before using StrongDM, we relied on VPN access and manual permission handling, which became difficult to audit and maintain over time as our team grew. Our main use case was centralized privileged access management for Kubernetes clusters. We also considered using it for Linux servers on-premises for the same application but opted out at that time due to limited usage and some internal platforms running on AWS. We aimed for developers and operations teams to get the access they needed without exposing long-lived credentials. StrongDM is instrumental in unifying access across different systems in our organization, alleviating the complications from separate tools. In the Kafka team, we had AWS infrastructure with Kubernetes clusters managing EC2 machines and internal services for different customers referring to our Kafka topics. StrongDM facilitated a centralized approach to access control, audit logging, and temporary authorization. For example, while working on the Kafka platform on EKS, developers and operations teams could utilize a unified access process across various environments, thus streamlining their work.
Iam Engineer at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Top 20
Feb 23, 2026
My use case for StrongDM is Privileged Access Management. I have privileged accounts because I am working for the Identity and Access Management team at my company. As an engineer, I have really privileged or elevated accounts for which I need my account onboarded to StrongDM, so I have to regularly use it.
Senior Data Engineer at a non-profit with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Top 10
Oct 29, 2024
I was part of the team managing the infrastructure for a small startup company. We used StrongDM to provide access to cloud private networks, control user access to databases, hosts through SSH, and Kubernetes resources.
StrongDM streamlines secure, password-less access, reducing attack surfaces with its zero trust approach. It integrates smoothly with existing systems supporting IP whitelisting and excels in managing runtime features while offering comprehensive audit logging and seamless resource access.StrongDM provides organizations with enhanced security through features like password rotation and efficient management of access to resources such as EC2 instances, Kubernetes clusters, and databases. Its...
In our environment, we have managed Linux servers, cloud resources, and production systems, and we use StrongDM as a privileged access management solution. StrongDM authenticates users through the identity provider, authorizes access based on RBAC, and establishes secure SSH connections. We also maintain complete audit logs of all user activities. For example, if our team needs to access an app server, DB server, or a Kubernetes cluster, instead of using SSH user@server, we first authenticate them through StrongDM. Then, StrongDM checks if the user is active and belongs to the cloud operations team, and if they have production access. If the criteria are met, StrongDM creates the security connection for them. Once the security connection is established, the cloud engineer logs in to the StrongDM portal, it performs SSO authentication, and the role is verified. Then, they are redirected to the StrongDM gateway, and the person can connect. No passwords need to be shared. Regarding the workflow, suppose there is an incident. Without StrongDM, we would have to find the key and then SSH to the production VM, which would take several minutes. With StrongDM, we go to the StrongDM portal, select the production VM, connect, and start troubleshooting. This saves time. The focus shifts from managing access to solving the incident within a few minutes. Regarding the audit process, everything will be recorded in StrongDM. The administrator knows who connected, which resource was accessed, and for how long they were active. We can get all of this information from the complete audit logs.
My main use case for StrongDM is to assess identity and authentication and authorization access control reviews. When I conduct internal audits or assessments to check the presence of security controls, I use StrongDM to navigate to the configuration settings panel to check what flags and features are enabled or disabled. I appreciate the UI of the overall tool and its functionality. There was a situation where I had to check whether the privileged account credentials maintained in StrongDM PAM tool are actually encrypted. I configured and opened StrongDM and checked the settings in the configuration window where I was able to verify that StrongDM contains controls and features which enable it to encrypt privileged account credentials. Additionally, it has features for auditing, generating audit trails, and log trails for all activities conducted by any user who is using privileged accounts. Apart from that, there is a database active monitoring tool embedded within StrongDM. These are certain cases where I have navigated this tool and found the UI to be very user-friendly.
My main use case for StrongDM is to provide access to database credentials. I wanted to give users access to the database and also to the applications that I have built for testing. Providing privileged access to users through StrongDM is the core use case I implemented.
My main use case for StrongDM is privileged access management and infrastructure access that we cater to, as we were looking for alternatives and solutions to securely control and monitor our access to servers. We have been using different kinds of Kubernetes clusters, databases, cloud infrastructure, and internal applications. Instead of giving direct access to our employees, the idea was a VPN-heavy access with shared keys for better usage. This is how I used it during my Kafka experience about three years ago, and also in my current team at GitLab. In one of those scenarios, my experience with StrongDM while working with Kubernetes in the Kafka team illustrates how we were initially looking for a better way to manage secure access to our infrastructure. Our teams scaled across different environments and regions, primarily Europe, including Sweden and India. Before using StrongDM, we relied on VPN access and manual permission handling, which became difficult to audit and maintain over time as our team grew. Our main use case was centralized privileged access management for Kubernetes clusters. We also considered using it for Linux servers on-premises for the same application but opted out at that time due to limited usage and some internal platforms running on AWS. We aimed for developers and operations teams to get the access they needed without exposing long-lived credentials. StrongDM is instrumental in unifying access across different systems in our organization, alleviating the complications from separate tools. In the Kafka team, we had AWS infrastructure with Kubernetes clusters managing EC2 machines and internal services for different customers referring to our Kafka topics. StrongDM facilitated a centralized approach to access control, audit logging, and temporary authorization. For example, while working on the Kafka platform on EKS, developers and operations teams could utilize a unified access process across various environments, thus streamlining their work.
My use case involves a company I'm working in that wants to secure the connectivity between the DevOps team and the backend server in the company.
My use case for StrongDM is Privileged Access Management. I have privileged accounts because I am working for the Identity and Access Management team at my company. As an engineer, I have really privileged or elevated accounts for which I need my account onboarded to StrongDM, so I have to regularly use it.
I was part of the team managing the infrastructure for a small startup company. We used StrongDM to provide access to cloud private networks, control user access to databases, hosts through SSH, and Kubernetes resources.
We use it for zero-trust privileged access.