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ARCON Privileged Access Management vs Symantec Privileged Access Manager comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 6, 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

ARCON Privileged Access Man...
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
8th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
36
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Symantec Privileged Access ...
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
18th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
53
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Privileged Access Management (PAM) category, the mindshare of ARCON Privileged Access Management is 4.0%, down from 4.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Privileged Access Manager is 1.6%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Privileged Access Management (PAM)
 

Featured Reviews

PRAVINKHISMATRAO - PeerSpot reviewer
Enhanced compliance and security through detailed action recordings
We have used ARCON Privileged Access Management for recording videos of user actions taken after logging into systems. Around thirty people, including network engineers, server engineers, and application engineers, use it in the company There hasn't been a notable financial benefit for our…
Muzi Lubisi - PeerSpot reviewer
Secure management of sensitive servers and seamless applications with direct linking
The credential injection feature is highly valued, particularly for RDP sessions. A majority of customers use it for RDP, and a couple for Linux servers. The broader capabilities, including access to multiple systems, web-based applications, and clustering, have never posed an issue. The threat analytics aspect is also a robust feature that analyzes all pertinent information.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product's deployment phase was easy."
"That dashboard is okay."
"One of the main benefits we've experienced is that Arcon helps us manage all our team's tasks and provides recording capabilities."
"With this log available, we can drill down to the activities performed by the people within our kiosk. There is a great feature where in the case of Unix servers, we have our own text-based logs. In the case of Window's server, we cannot create a text-based log, so our kiosk takes the screenshot or picture of the screen when I am working. It does this every three seconds."
"Logging, particularly screen recording for Windows RDP sessions. Also, command-logging for SSH sessions. This really helps us to see what commands/changes have been executed in a particular service at a given point of time, and by whom."
"It was very easy for us to move this application and database from on-premise to cloud, as well as configure new things, such as load balancing. The product is very compatible."
"We use ARCON Privileged Access Management to monitor and record our admin users' activity."
"Overall, I would rate ARCON Privileged Access Management nine out of ten."
"Stability is solid as a rock."
"Whoever built it from the ground up, they understand how an organization is laid out."
"It reduces the viral attacks on my website. It also allows certain users access to see what happens daily."
"The DB clustering is a really good benefit of using CA PAM."
"The RDP-gateway: For limiting which server an operator can access."
"Comprehensive coverage of the required features for the PAM solution."
"We can enforce complicated password policies and very important frequent password changes."
"Symantec PAM is easier to deploy compared to its competitors, such as BeyondTrust."
 

Cons

"The auto-password change feature which was recently added. It is supposed to change the password. However, in some cases, while changing the password, it has caused me to lose to connection due to network-related issues or something similar. What we need to have is a type of log for failure of password change."
"This product is lacking in terms of dashboarding analytics and should have user behavior analytics. It should also have better dashboarding for executive management and security managers, which this product is missing."
"We expect improvement in the dashboards to provide visibility of password compliance status, whenever a password is opened from the vault. Also, flexibility to customize the live dashboard."
"If an ID gets locked, the tool cannot unlock it, making it an area where improvements are required."
"I would like to see a "wild card" kind of a feature or something that would enable us to search the video."
"They need to support all web browsers. At the moment it only supports Explorer, IE. They have to come up with a solution to support all browsers."
"The solution needs more work on the password management side of things. Password management is a big challenge for us, and I would like to improve this aspect. We're finding that BeyondTrust is better in this regard, which is why we're probably going to migrate over. It will offer better security I think."
"Managing users is difficult, so that is something that can be improved."
"Recent releases need improvement in webpage management. For instance, navigating through a webpage that acts like a wizard, where I proceed to the next page and enter more information, is not handled well by the system."
"We experience stability issues after every patch upgrade. This is a place where CA needs to improve drastically."
"Technical support was good when CA handled it. After Broadcom took over, it's not as good."
"I would like this solution to be simpler. It should have a one-click access that works together with AWS."
"An improvement for this solution is that it should not be constantly based on user name and password. There should be a condition to edit and update your username."
"Broadcom has neglected product development since acquiring Symantec, and nothing major has been added to PAM."
"They need to have zero tier and active-active setup ​with zero minimum downtime, which they are working on it. ​"
"Recent releases need improvement in webpage management."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is good value for our business. According to me, their competitors are more costly. Therefore, it is quite affordable. I find the ARCON to be much cheaper than the other products in the market."
"There are no major concerns with licensing because we can handle multiple servers in our kiosk system."
"Pricing is low and licensing is flexible."
"The solution’s pricing is neither cheap nor expensive."
"Pricing and licensing are good, very aggressive."
"I am not in a position to give any financials, but whatever we have paid, it is value for money. Their licensing model is good. They have been flexible for us."
"ARCON Privileged Access Management's pricing is reasonable."
"The pricing and licensing model is very economical."
"Cost-wise, CA was better compared to others in the market. ​"
"Pricing is fair compared to other top vendors."
"The version we are using is affordable compared to BeyondTrust, which is maybe three to four times as expensive, but it depends on the features."
"I would prefer better licensing options for the 20-100 users we have at a given time."
"They offer per-device, per-user, or monthly and yearly licensing models."
"It is more expensive than other solutions on the market."
"The licensing is simple and scalable."
"Don’t go with an agent model. Don’t go with a model that has you buying a thousand different parts. Go with PAM that gives you everything, or you’ll just be paying costs of implementing another tool that PAM would have just given you up front."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
21%
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with ARCON Privileged Access Management?
From an end-user point of view, it would be beneficial if the system could provide information about the last login. This would help identify if the server was accessed by me or if someone has pote...
What do you like most about Symantec Privileged Access Manager?
We can check the activities in the server for fragile files and documents in case of any issues.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Symantec Privileged Access Manager?
Due to the nature of the solution, it is hard to gauge, but compared to competitors, the pricing is very good. I would rate it as an eight and a half out of ten.
What needs improvement with Symantec Privileged Access Manager?
Recent releases need improvement in webpage management. For instance, navigating through a webpage that acts like a wizard, where I proceed to the next page and enter more information, is not handl...
 

Also Known As

ARCON ARCOS, ARCON PAM
CA PAM, Xceedium Xsuite, CA Privileged Access Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

RAK Bank, AXIS Bank, Reliance Capital, Kotak Life Insurance, MTS
NEOVERA, Telesis, eSoft
Find out what your peers are saying about ARCON Privileged Access Management vs. Symantec Privileged Access Manager and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
861,490 professionals have used our research since 2012.