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

Aruba ClearPass vs Impulse Point SafeConnect comparison

Why PeerSpot?
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Aruba ClearPass
Ranking in Network Access Control (NAC)
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
90
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Impulse Point SafeConnect
Ranking in Network Access Control (NAC)
16th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Network Access Control (NAC) category, the mindshare of Aruba ClearPass is 17.8%, down from 22.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Impulse Point SafeConnect is 1.8%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Access Control (NAC) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Aruba ClearPass17.8%
Impulse Point SafeConnect1.8%
Other80.4%
Network Access Control (NAC)
 

Featured Reviews

Darko Skurla - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Enterprise Customer Solutions Specialist at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees
Role-based policies have simplified secure access control for all users and smart devices
I do not know about the functionality of Aruba ClearPass integration with a third party. If you ask me if there is support for Zebra and for different IoT devices, they have it. However, I do not know how to describe integration with other products. Aruba ClearPass can act as a RADIUS server and it can connect to the domain RADIUS server, for example. The biggest problem is when a customer does not know what they want with Aruba ClearPass. I can recommend Aruba ClearPass to other users because it is very stable. My review rating for this product is ten out of ten.
CD
Director of Computer Information Services at a university with 5,001-10,000 employees
Easy to scale, enforces policies well, and has responsive technical support
A lot of campuses use SafeConnect. It gives us good visibility and enforces policies. It helps enforce network security by scanning devices, making sure they have current and valid antivirus solutions with up-to-date antivirus definitions, and steers our end users by enforcing policy groups and steering them to the right access. Technical support is responsive. The stability is pretty good. It is very easy to scale the product.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The aspect of Aruba ClearPass that I like most is that it has a lot of options, it is very versatile."
"Overall, Aruba ClearPass is a very good product, we feel very confident using it, and it is a product that I would recommend."
"What I like best about Aruba ClearPass is its 802.1X certificate-based authentication feature."
"If you are looking at the base installation, then it was a very straightforward process, which I would rate an eight or nine out of ten."
"The most valuable feature for us is the policy compliance."
"Bringing mobile devices on to the network has been simplified and secured at the same time."
"Aruba ClearPass has a very good technical support team; whenever we need the vendor to be involved, we find a good deal of technical support."
"Aruba ClearPass improved security across a diverse network, which is countrywide."
"It is very easy to scale the product."
"It gives us good visibility and enforces policies, helps enforce network security by scanning devices, making sure they have current and valid antivirus solutions with up-to-date antivirus definitions, and steers our end users by enforcing policy groups and steering them to the right access."
 

Cons

"It was a complex solution to set up because of its newness."
"The cost of Aruba is very, very high. It's the biggest challenge we have with this product."
"I would describe the initial setup as moderately difficult."
"The monitoring of Aruba ClearPass needs improvement."
"Licensing cost is extremely high."
"What needs improvement in Aruba ClearPass is just the endpoint context server, in particular, the indication with the context server because sometimes the daily process isn't as smooth-sailing. Sometimes, the information isn't up-to-date. I'm not sure if that's a vendor limitation, but currently, it's the only tricky part of the current configuration. What I'd like to see in the next release of Aruba ClearPass is a dashboard or a monitoring feature that would allow users to see the integration process with an external server because there's no visibility into that right now."
"In the next version, I would like to see some enhancement or extension on the tracking side. For example, when any user enters the network, it should be more visible in the graphical form."
"Aruba ClearPass could improve the user interface, it is a bit chunky."
"The solution would be much better if it offered self-service onboarding."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I can say that the package or licensing model offered for the solution is a permanent one."
"Licensing and pricing are extremely straightforward."
"There are three types of licenses."
"The product is quite expensive. I rate its pricing a seven out of ten."
"The licensing model is very straightforward. There are two types of licensing for Aruba ClearPass, a perpetual license, and a subscription. Both of them are straightforward. We don't need to read an ordering guide, it's very clear."
"Aruba ClearPass has permanent licenses. You purchase it one time and this license is yours. You don't need to refresh it for five years, et cetera. They have a couple of licenses for enabled features with not only one license."
"The pricing model for Aruba ClearPass is complex. Customers only pay for the license fees, with no additional costs."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is too expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a six out of ten."
"For our tier group, for one year, the cost is probably around $10,000 for the license. If you do multi-year, you could get two years, and you could get it for about $8,000 per year. If you do three years, you get it around $7,000 a year."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Network Access Control (NAC) solutions are best for your needs.
920,929 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business44
Midsize Enterprise25
Large Enterprise34
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better - Aruba Clearpass or Cisco ISE?
Aruba ClearPass is a Network Access Control tool that gives secure network access to multiple device types. You can adapt the policies to VPN access, wired, or wireless access. You can securely ...
What is the biggest difference between Aruba ClearPass and FortiNAC?
I've done quite a lot of work with ClearPass, and not a lot with FortiNAC/Bradford. ClearPass incorporates a number of different functions including ClearPass Guest for creating complex wireless g...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Aruba ClearPass?
Compared to Cisco and others, the pricing is reasonable. Licensing costs are case-specific and have been manageable.
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

Avenda eTIPS
SafeConnect
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Consulate Health Care, Los Angeles Unified School District, Science Applications International Corp (SAIC), San Diego State University, KFC, ACTS Retirement-Life Communities
Aerohive Solution
Find out what your peers are saying about Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Cisco, Portnox Security and others in Network Access Control (NAC). Updated: October 2026.
920,929 professionals have used our research since 2012.