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AWS IAM Identity Center vs Cisco Duo comparison

 

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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
7.9
AWS IAM Identity Center boosts ROI by enhancing efficiency, security, cost management, and user experience through improved access control and auditing.
Sentiment score
7.4
Cisco Duo enhances security, boosts staff morale, saves costs, and improves operations, despite perceived productivity impacts.
The return on investment includes operational efficiency gains, security risk reduction, compliance with regulations, improved user experience, productivity benefits, reduced overhead, and better security posture.
We have achieved significant time efficiencies with AWS IAM Identity Center.
I think Cisco Duo offers a good return on investment for startups, newer organizations, or those utilizing cloud-based applications.
I have not seen ROI with Cisco Duo; probably the opposite, because it impedes productivity time to be able to get into the system.
From my point of view, the biggest return on investment when using Cisco Duo is the security and the ease of setting it up.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.3
AWS IAM Identity Center offers effective, prompt support with comprehensive documentation, though a live chat option is desired.
Sentiment score
7.5
Cisco Duo's support is highly rated for expertise and solutions, but some users note delays and improvement needs.
AWS provides immediate solutions and assistance whenever needed, especially if issues arise that cannot be handled internally.
They are prompt, keep you updated, and provide excellent assistance.
AWS offers better assistance plans for their services.
They got back to us quickly, were nice, and gave us what we needed.
Other support sections have failed miserably because of the lack of response time.
I would rate the technical service and customer support of Cisco Duo a ten out of ten.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
8.3
AWS IAM Identity Center efficiently manages large user bases and permissions, supporting organizational growth and integrating with AWS Organizations.
Sentiment score
8.1
Cisco Duo is scalable, easily integrates across sites, and supports thousands of users without disruptions, adapting to various applications.
AWS Identity Center successfully supports scalable deployments, allowing additional resources as the company grows.
The scalability of AWS IAM Identity Center is excellent.
It can handle both a small number of users and a bigger number of users efficiently.
I believe Cisco Duo is very scalable because it is cloud-based.
We started out with just the basics, getting a token, and then we changed to push, and now, we have added the offline mode.
It scales easily because it is just tied into our identity provider, and it grows along with that.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.7
AWS IAM Identity Center is praised for its reliability and efficiency, with consistent performance and 99.96% uptime.
Sentiment score
8.4
Cisco Duo is highly stable and reliable, with minimal downtime and quick issue resolution, maintaining productivity efficiently.
There can be issues if there is an outage on AWS's side, which could prevent logging in because your region might be down, affecting the Identity Center's availability.
It offers 99.96% uptime.
Stability-wise, it is functioning well without any outages or crashes.
When there is a bigger problem, we get notifications from Cisco Duo saying, 'Hey, we have a problem,' and that has helped us.
It is very reliable, easy to use, and I don't have too many issues with it.
There has been no downtime, crashes, or performance issues with Cisco Duo.
 

Room For Improvement

AWS IAM Identity Center needs enhancements in user interface, integration, flexibility, security, automation, and comprehensive documentation.
Cisco Duo needs telephony credit, integration, deployment, and user interface improvements, plus better licensing, documentation, and older app compatibility.
Having a lot of users on one instance is hard to configure, so I hope for more flexibility and ease in configuration.
Enhancements could include automation tools or a centralized dashboard for managing roles and policies across multiple accounts, simplifying the process.
When configuring it with third-party tools, like Active Directory, the naming convention of permission sets requires careful attention, which can be confusing.
Cisco should allow easier integration with third-party equipment because Cisco's own equipment is expensive.
There needs to be consideration for how to launch Cisco Duo with a handheld device that is not native, where you can install the application.
There has to be a way to make the whole process of push notifications easier, so that when I have my phone with me, I do not have to do anything.
 

Setup Cost

AWS IAM Identity Center is cost-effective, offering free basic features, while advanced features may require budget planning.
Cisco Duo's pricing is competitive, flexible, straightforward, and suited for large enterprises, with premium support and moderate setup costs.
AWS IAM Identity Center is available as a free service by default.
It is not that expensive, rated at three out of ten for costs.
Pricing for AWS IAM Identity Center is very affordable, rated at two out of ten with one being cheap.
The approximate cost is around eighty dollars per user.
Licensing is straightforward and convenient for higher education because student populations are included.
I am pleased that the prices remained stable after Cisco acquired the solution.
 

Valuable Features

AWS IAM Identity Center offers centralized access control, enhanced security, and automated role management for efficient and secure cloud operations.
Cisco Duo is praised for its versatile multi-factor authentication, integration, user-friendly interface, and adaptability to hybrid environments.
It provides the least privilege-based access control, which limits users to only the operations they need to perform without interfering with unrelated configurations.
These features allow for excellent micro-level control over resources, ensuring specific permissions are granted.
Its valuable features include granular access control, allowing precise control over who can access specific AWS resources and under what conditions using JSON-based policies.
From a management perspective, I appreciate that we can enroll or control devices on the back end for people who get a new phone and forget to handle Cisco Duo properly and need to add a new device.
The benefit of having a complete passwordless environment in our organization is that it's gotten people away from using the sticky note under their keyboard - which is a huge problem.
A valuable feature of the solution is its hybrid structure, which involves proxy agents running on-premises while other services are on the cloud.
 

Categories and Ranking

AWS IAM Identity Center
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
8th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (7th)
Cisco Duo
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
2nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
74
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (2nd), ZTNA as a Service (6th), Cisco Security Portfolio (3rd), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of AWS IAM Identity Center is 2.0%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco Duo is 6.1%, down from 7.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

Featured Reviews

Khaled Saidi - PeerSpot reviewer
Manage cloud security with granular access control and enhanced authentication
Managing IAM in complex environments can be challenging, and there are several areas for improvement. First, incorporating automation tools or a centralized dashboard for managing roles and policies across multiple accounts would simplify administration, especially for large organizations. Additionally, policy debugging and validation could be more streamlined, as troubleshooting misconfigurations can be time-consuming and prone to errors. A more robust error messaging system or a dedicated debugging tool would be beneficial. Another area for improvement is temporary access credentials. AWS documentation should offer more detailed guidance on edge cases and exceptions, along with clearer examples of how to handle various scenarios. Lastly, enhanced session-level policies that are more context-sensitive and based on specific conditions (such as IP address, device, or time) would greatly increase flexibility and allow for more granular control over user sessions.
Patrick Stevenson - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized authentication simplifies logins and saves time
There aren't any new features or functionalities in Cisco Duo that my company has started using recently; we use it primarily for the authentication portion. There are other features we can use, yet we haven't turned those options on yet, so that's more a matter of time than anything. We have many different vendors and types of devices that we require MFA for login. That said, Duo helps bring all of those accounts into one system, in conjunction with ISE, you have one username, one password, and you access all the devices instead of having every device have its own credentials. It lowers the number of passwords you need to have. Cisco Duo is on the right track for improvement. A lot of their devices already integrate with it now. They keep adding features for more devices that interact natively with it, instead of having to have a third-party server to reach out to Duo. I would rate Cisco Duo overall about an eight out of ten; it's a strong product.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Performing Arts
7%
Computer Software Company
21%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about AWS IAM Identity Center?
The product is easy for beginners to learn and use.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS IAM Identity Center?
AWS provides the lowest pricing among other service providers like Azure, Google, Oracle. It is cost-effective, and they use a pay-as-you-go model.
What needs improvement with AWS IAM Identity Center?
There are new AI features coming to AWS that are easy and simple to use. However, focusing on further allowing customization and flexibility in developing solutions as a solution architect or devel...
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 do you like most about Duo Security?
They are users who, as mentioned before, utilize RDPAP and MDPAP. It includes functionalities related to finance, specifically in single sign-on.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Duo Security?
My experience with the pricing, setup cost, and licensing of Cisco Duo is honestly above my pay grade. I don't know any of that.
 

Also Known As

AWS Single Sign On, AWS SSO
Duo Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Expedia, Intuit, Royal Dutch Shell, Brooks Brothers
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS IAM Identity Center vs. Cisco Duo and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.