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BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access 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

BeyondTrust Privileged Remo...
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
13th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
Remote Access (15th)
Symantec Privileged Access ...
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
16th
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 September 2025, in the Privileged Access Management (PAM) category, the mindshare of BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access is 4.4%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Privileged Access Manager is 1.5%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Privileged Access Management (PAM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access4.4%
Symantec Privileged Access Manager1.5%
Other94.1%
Privileged Access Management (PAM)
 

Featured Reviews

Hahn Rolf - PeerSpot reviewer
Securely manage high-privilege remote access with granular configurations
I recommend that we improve integration with other products like PasswordSafe, aiming for smoother integration. Better alignment between products would enhance manageability from a single point. Additionally, BeyondTrust should focus on automating the update process to reduce unnecessary ticket creation. Improved quality control for non-English language versions is needed to avoid translation and layout errors.
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

"Its initial setup process is straightforward."
"The visibility of the solution's Vault works as it is supposed to: out-of-the-box for domain accounts, endpoints, and local accounts associated with discovery jobs."
"We like the integration with Active Directory. It allows us to discover the endpoints and user accounts that need protection. It's a good way of securing our privileged access."
"Its security, simplicity, and ease of deployment and maintenance are the most valuable. It is FIPS compliant, so it goes through severe penetration testing every one year or two years. They have to maintain this compliance. It is very safe. Customers have been using it in the last eight years because of the simplicity of getting it deployed quickly. Most of the people using the solution had been hacked already, so they needed it quickly. As compared to the other solutions in the market, it can be turned on in production very quickly. You don't really need to have a server. It can be deployed very rapidly on VMware or Hyper-V, and you don't need to do an installation. It is a kind of an all-included package that you just deploy in a VM environment. It is basically a VM that is specifically built for a customer. The way the PRA data solutions work is that you need to build them for each customer because of being hard-coded with their SSL certificate, their web page name, and all that."
"It is a real fortress. Its security is very strong. Multi-factor came as a feature out-of-the-box, which was big for us. That helps us meet another compliance requirement. It enforces encryption. Nobody can see what we are doing in our remote system if they happen to be listening for unencrypted traffic. That is its biggest strength."
"When it comes to the Privileged Remote Access (PRA) solution, instead of depending on a VPN client, from Cisco or any other vendor, we can directly use this product from the internet. It is very easy to do the implementation, and it is easy for every user to access the server from outside of their organization. They can open the URL and put their name and password, and it'll do the multi-factor authentication. They can easily access the server. Prior to this solution, the users had to log into the VPN, which is not required with BeyondTrust. Now, they can use their computer over the internet."
"We can truly elevate our admin rights while we're in there to fully take control of a system and manage it as if it was sitting right here on our desk. Most of the organization has gone to remote work or work from home. With that being the case, this solution allows us to be able to still work with our end-users, even though they're not always sitting on our network."
"The features I find most effective in BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access include the advantages of password safe for anyone using their web server designing or applications."
"It is great for identity governance."
"Comprehensive coverage of the required features for the PAM solution."
"It reduces the viral attacks on my website. It also allows certain users access to see what happens daily."
"The agent-based credential management solution allows clients to programmatically use the agent to collect passwords during runtime from Symantec Privileged Access Manager."
"We have received good support from the tech support team."
"It will provide us with more security."
"It's easy to use and easy to configure."
"We can check the activities in the server for fragile files and documents in case of any issues."
 

Cons

"When doing protocol panel jumps, the tool does not restrict what is recorded on the user's computer."
"The solution's Vault is a nice feature. It helps to securely share a security password in teams, but it is not at the level of a password management solution. So, it is just really a vault. We were expecting to have more features to better manage passwords, but that is something that you can work around if you also have a password safe solution. I would like them to have features like password rotation or password auditing, e.g., old passwords."
"The solution is very flexible, which is a plus, but I would say the implementation requires someone with knowledge and experience, as it can be easy to get lost in all the details. The implementation process could be streamlined and simplified. Though the complexity of the solution provides greater flexibility, it requires a lot of time to understand it fully."
"With the current scenario of BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access, some analytics should come with an AI/ML base and highlight if someone is doing something risky during access."
"Some of the capabilities in the solution were not as available or not as outstanding as CyberArk. We had to manage whatever little was available for us, especially its recording capabilities, logs, and a number of things."
"They could probably integrate a wizard or something like that to add a new use case. It could be something that makes it easier to add a new use case."
"The integration client, backup solution, and SSO setup and provisioning could be improved. There isn't any documented or supported user provisioning currently, which slows down the processes of onboarding and assigning permissions. I would like to see this improved soon."
"There is no connectivity to the appliance side. There is no API, and it is just difficult for me to capture what version the device is on without going in and doing screenshots. It is a little too secure in that regard, where they don't even trust their product owner. Since a lot of hacks come from the inside, they are probably doing what they need to do out of necessity. It is just that I have to work pretty hard to produce compliance data on the box."
"The support for other remote assistance tools would be excellent. Free included tools in Windows (Remote Assist) and Microsoft SCCM Configuration Manager (ConMgr Remote Control) allow companies to reduce the amount of RDP connections and expand the usage of the tools are frequently used by companies to provide technical support for remote assistance."
"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."
"Technical support was good when CA handled it. After Broadcom took over, it's not as good."
"They need to do a little bit more on the mainframe side.​"
"The service account management functionality needs to be extended to application pools, SQL database, PowerShell scripts, service account discovery, etc."
"We experience stability issues after every patch upgrade. This is a place where CA needs to improve drastically."
"It'd be great if you just stuck in your PIV card and Windows popped up, asked you for your password. You typed it in, then it remembered your credentials."
"We have to do a lot of manual work to automate features."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"PRA's pricing is competitive."
"Its price is pretty good for the features and services that it provides. It is not outrageous. I'm not aware of any additional charges or anything like that."
"PRA was one of the cheapest solutions that we evaluated."
"I rate the product's pricing a four on a scale of one to ten, where one is high, and ten is low. It is an expensive product."
"The price is pretty expensive, but you get what you pay for and this is a great product."
"Don't get into a situation where you are licensing per desktop or per person until you fully understand the licensing."
"I wish it was a little bit cheaper, but when a product is as solid as this, I understand what the cost does. It helps them to make sure it stays that way. If you want a reliable, solid product, you're going to pay more."
"I wasn't directly involved in the licensing and pricing, but I can say that PRA is licensed per endpoint added to the Vault. I would advise users to take frequent exports of their license usage package; it's a simple feature that provides a spreadsheet of every machine in the Vault. This helps to cut down on duplicate licenses, which can happen by adding the same endpoint using an IP address and a fully qualified domain name, for instance. The implementation is an additional cost, and they offer several tiers, so the price varies. There are also some optional add-ons, so I would advise people to research the product well and find out precisely what they need regarding features. The Advanced Web Access add-on provides some required functionality when interfacing with websites; that's one to consider."
"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."
"They offer per-device, per-user, or monthly and yearly licensing models."
"It is more expensive than other solutions on the market."
"I would prefer better licensing options for the 20-100 users we have at a given time."
"Cost-wise, CA was better compared to others in the market. ​"
"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."
"The prices are not low, but one can ask for a discount. It’s not the cheapest PAM solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Comms Service Provider
16%
Computer Software Company
15%
Government
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise30
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access?
The product has improved remote support capabilities since it works fine.
What needs improvement with BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access?
Improving technical support for BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access is essential. When I communicate with technical support for BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access, the response time is very slow.
What is your primary use case for BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access?
When we are using BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access with FortiGate or some Cisco third-party products, we collaborate with both vendors, take the requirement, and follow up with the technical te...
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

Bomgar Privileged Access
CA PAM, Xceedium Xsuite, CA Privileged Access Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Horizon Beverage, Air Liquide, Gateway Bank of Florida
NEOVERA, Telesis, eSoft
Find out what your peers are saying about BeyondTrust Privileged Remote Access vs. Symantec Privileged Access Manager and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
867,676 professionals have used our research since 2012.