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Microsoft Entra ID vs Thales SafeNet Trusted Access comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 11, 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

Microsoft Entra ID
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
1st
Ranking in Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS)
1st
Ranking in Access Management
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
266
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (1st), Identity Management (IM) (2nd), Microsoft Security Suite (2nd)
Thales SafeNet Trusted Access
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
20th
Ranking in Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS)
25th
Ranking in Access Management
23rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Entra ID is 12.6%, down from 26.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Thales SafeNet Trusted Access is 1.5%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Entra ID12.6%
Thales SafeNet Trusted Access1.5%
Other85.9%
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

Featured Reviews

JP
Senior Information Security Engineer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Implementing seamless integration boosts secure access and supports Zero Trust
What I appreciate the most about Microsoft Entra ID is that it integrates seamlessly with all the Defender products and is easy to use. Microsoft Entra ID's integration capabilities influence our Zero Trust model by allowing us to enforce our Zero Trust model. Conditional access policies allow us to leverage Microsoft Entra ID to verify that devices signing in to our cloud services are coming from registered devices, and that people are passing all the other requirements we have in order to complete sign-on or conditional access policies. Since implementing Microsoft Entra ID, I've observed changes in the frequency and nature of identity-related security incidents. The organization already had it implemented when I arrived, and I've been working to enhance it. Better configuration of Microsoft Entra ID has allowed us to better protect our organization from threats. Having it alone isn't a solution, but ensuring proper configuration goes a long way in preventing future compromises. My company's approach to defending against token theft and nation-state attacks has evolved since implementing Microsoft Entra ID. We haven't experienced any known compromises from nation-state attacks, and implementing newer features gives me more confidence in our protection. Regarding device-bound passkeys in Microsoft Authenticator and our approach to phishing-resistant authentication, we are currently implementing Microsoft Entra ID certificate-based authentication. Adding a strong form of MFA is important as we found it to be the most cost-effective way. While other solutions might be equally or more secure, they are significantly more expensive. Having worked as an IT consultant mainly with the Microsoft stack across various industries, I have experience with different identity management solutions. Microsoft Entra ID remains the best option. The major advantages when comparing it to Okta include integration with Defender products, Defender for Identities' integration with conditional access policies, and insider threat management integration for blocking sign-ins based on risk factors. The enhancement of Microsoft Entra ID's implementation is relatively straightforward. My main concern is the occasional lack of documentation and the frequency of changes, which can make feature location challenging.
GauravMathur - PeerSpot reviewer
Vice President Information Technology at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Simple to use, easy to set up, and performs well
I'm not saying that we want to switch the product, however, since the requirement has increased, we are looking at other options that may be better suited. The scalability may not there. We have a few specific use cases where we have to avoid the cloud. Especially in Europe, we're not allowed to carry their phone in factories. We need some sort of secure access solution. There's a dependency on Microsoft Azure. I am paying to SafeNet and in parallel, I also need to pay Microsoft to use the same service. That makes no sense, to pay double. If they could do something about it, that would be very good.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The stability of Microsoft Entra ID is very great."
"It's a quite comprehensive solution and it scales quite well within our required scale as well, which is very useful."
"It has been stable, and we haven't had any issues since we started to use it."
"Entra ID provides an excellent overview of the applications and the options applied to them."
"Application integration is easy. MFA and password self-service have reduced most of the supportive work of IT. We use multi-factor authentication. Every access from a user is through multi-factor authentication. There is no legacy authentication. We have blocked legacy authentication methods. For people who use the MDM on mobile, we push our application through Intune. In a hybrid environment, users can work from anywhere. With Intune, we can push policies and secure the data."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its ability to delegate roles to each individual resource, which is great."
"The main valuable feature is the integration into a single console, which includes authentication service and endpoint security."
"Entra ID can be deployed using a hybrid model for organizations with a significant on-premises presence, or in a fully cloud-based setup for those that do not."
"The interface is easy to use."
"The solution is simple to use."
"The validation and integrity features of the endpoint are great."
 

Cons

"You can manage the users from the Office 365 administration center, and you can manage them from Azure Active Directory. Those are two different environments, but they do the same things. They can gather the features in one place, and it might be better if that place were Azure."
"The most challenging aspect I found was the creation of organizational units and specific domains. They have a tool called Bastion, which is expensive and a little bit confusing."
"The quality of support has declined in recent years."
"When it comes to identity and access life cycle management for applications that are run on-premises, as well as access governance, if those kinds of capabilities could be built into Azure Active Directory, that would be good."
"Sometimes I sense complications when moving from one tenant to another, which is simply because different enterprises have different security guidelines."
"Transitioning to the cloud is very difficult. They need the training to make it easier."
"Whatever business requirements we needed in the past three years, users were created, with the name of the user and they were not connected with the Active Directory. We were trying to in house in three years and with directory, but we were not able to achieve it."
"Allowing for more customization would be very useful. There is a limited metadata capability. When you look at a user, there are only six pieces of information you can see, but organizations are way more complex, so having that metadata available and being able to use that for dynamic user groups and other policies would be very helpful."
"There's a dependency on Microsoft Azure."
"SafeNet's reporting and monitoring features could be improved."
"Lacks the ability to integrate network monitoring solutions and authenticate the app users."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I'm not totally aware of the pricing and licensing, but I do know that the pricing and licensing must be quite balanced. We are a pretty old client of Microsoft, and MSA is just one of the services we use from Microsoft. There's a whole Microsoft 365 suite that's implemented as well. I'm sure it is something that is acceptable to both parties."
"We are working with the Premium P2 licenses, which are reasonable. If you invest in the on-premises environment setup, then it costs so much. However, on-prem AD gives you the ability to manage your organization in a very organized manner, where you can create a group policy."
"It is costly."
"Azure has an educational package available for students with a variety of licenses and different software available."
"Entra's pricing is somewhat higher compared to AWS."
"Everything needs to be considered for the requirements and if it is within the budget, then you can come up with a solution, whether it is SaaS, PaaS, or IaaS."
"Compared to other Microsoft products, the cost is not too expensive. There's a free tier available, though it doesn't include all features. Overall, it's well-priced."
"The process for buying licenses from Microsoft is somewhat messy and really hard to do. We have to talk to someone because it's hard to find out how many licenses we need. If I'm applying for 2,000 users, how many Windows licenses do we need? They could also charge less for support."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
Performing Arts
10%
Legal Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business85
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise155
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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 is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Active Directory?
My experience with the pricing, setup costs, and licensing of Microsoft Entra ID is that it is decent.
What needs improvement with Azure Active Directory?
I think Microsoft Entra ID could be improved by assigning permissions to nested groups in the next release.
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Also Known As

Azure AD, Azure Active Directory, Azure Active Directory, Microsoft Authenticator
SafeNet Trusted Access, Gemalto SafeNet Trusted Access
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Entre ID is trusted by companies of all sizes and industries including Walmart, Zscaler, Uniper, Amtrak, monday.com, and more.
IBM, Western Union, Vanderbilt University Medical Centre, Novartis, and AT&T.
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Entra ID vs. Thales SafeNet Trusted Access and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
881,114 professionals have used our research since 2012.