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Change Auditor for Active Directory vs One Identity Active Roles comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 1, 2026

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

Change Auditor for Active D...
Ranking in Active Directory Management
7th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
One Identity Active Roles
Ranking in Active Directory Management
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
87
Ranking in other categories
User Provisioning Software (3rd), Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Active Directory Management category, the mindshare of Change Auditor for Active Directory is 5.6%, down from 7.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of One Identity Active Roles is 12.3%, up from 6.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Active Directory Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
One Identity Active Roles12.3%
Change Auditor for Active Directory5.6%
Other82.1%
Active Directory Management
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2794194 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr Mgr Cyber Defense at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees
Auditing changes has become faster and now uncovers misconfigurations within minutes
The best features Change Auditor for Active Directory offers are that it's lightweight and easy to understand. You don't have to memorize event IDs since it's in English. What makes Change Auditor for Active Directory lightweight and easy to understand in my experience is that it doesn't require the events to record to the domain controllers. Therefore, I can focus just on the event types without having to turn up detailed logging on my DCs. Change Auditor for Active Directory has positively impacted my organization by helping us respond to audits very quickly to show that we had evidence of who was making the changes and match them up to the ticket request and who approved it. After implementing Change Auditor for Active Directory, it has allowed us to answer questions literally in minutes, whereas it would have taken us half a day to a day before.
Varun Mehra - PeerSpot reviewer
collaboration support engineer at a retailer with 11-50 employees
Automation has transformed onboarding and access control and now streamlines daily governance
While One Identity Active Roles is a strong identity and access management solution overall, there are a few areas where it could improve. One challenge we experienced was the initial setup and configuration complexity. Deploying workflows, policies, and delegation models require careful planning and a good understanding of the Active Directory environment. For organizations without experienced administrators, the learning curve can feel quite steep in the beginning. The user interface could also be more modern and intuitive. Some administrative tasks require navigating through multiple menus and the overall experience could be simplified for faster day-to-day management. Another area for improvement is reporting and customization. While the auditing features are good, creating highly customized reports sometimes requires additional efforts or scripting knowledge. More built-in reporting templates and easier dashboard customization would be helpful. We have also noticed that troubleshooting workflows or synchronization issues can occasionally take time because the logs can be very detailed and technical. Better diagnostic tools and simpler error explanations would improve the operational experience. That said, once the platform is properly configured and maintained, it performs reliably and delivers strong automation, delegation, and governance capabilities. One additional area where One Identity Active Roles could improve is cloud integration and hybrid environment management. While it works well with Active Directory and the Microsoft environment, organizations moving heavily towards cloud-first infrastructure may want even deeper and more seamless integration with modern SaaS platforms and identity providers. Performance optimization in large environments could be improved. In very large enterprise deployments with complex workflows and multiple managed domains, some administrative actions and synchronization tasks can occasionally feel slower than expected. Another point is documentation and onboarding resources. The product is feature-rich, but some advanced configurations require going through extensive documentation. More practical examples, guided setup wizards, and easier to follow best practice guides would help new administrators adopt the platform faster. Overall, the core functionality is solid, and most of the pain points are related more to usability, complexity, and modernization rather than the reliability. One additional improvement I would mention is around integration flexibility with third-party ITSM and DevOps tools. While the platform integrates well within Microsoft-centric environments, broader out-of-the-box integration and simpler API workflows for non-Microsoft ecosystems would make deployment and automation easier for organizations using diverse infrastructure. Another area is upgrade and migration simplicity. In enterprise environments, version upgrades and environment migration sometimes require careful planning and testing. Streamlining that process with more automated compatibility checks and migration assistance would reduce operational overhead.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable features are the ability to protect Active Directory accounts and groups, and the real-time notifications that help manage Active Directory more effectively."
"Change Auditor for Active Directory has positively impacted my organization by helping us respond to audits very quickly to show that we had evidence of who was making the changes and match them up to the ticket request and who approved it."
"One Identity Active Roles takes us less time, probably half the time, to complete delegations that are very granular and complex, compared to having to use native tools and scripts."
"ARS probably saves us at least two weeks out of every month."
"It's valuable to us in that it resembles the native tools that most people have grown accustomed to... Active Roles resembles traditional tools, such as from Microsoft. That is really good because it eases the way people interact with the tool."
"The most valuable features include auditing, dynamic grouping, and creating dynamic groups based on AD attributes."
"Because of Active Roles, we're able to synchronize on an even more regular basis. It enables us to provide even more information to the Active Directory, which helped us to group our users in a more consistent manner."
"Since we have implemented One Identity Active Roles, we have seen significant improvements, with faster user management, better control over Active Directory, reduced errors, and improved security."
"With the use of the sync service we were able to import information from multiple external systems and populate them within our space and leverage them for downstream systems."
"The best part of this Active Roles is the workflow engine. It features an industry-leading workflow automation feature. It's a visual PowerShell that allows task interruption."
 

Cons

"Change Auditor for Active Directory could be improved if the client were more flexible when installed, so if I upgrade the server, I wouldn't have to replace the clients at the same time."
"Areas that could be improved include having more management capabilities with command-line scripts and more flexibility in general."
"One area where One Identity Active Roles could be improved is troubleshooting and visibility."
"One Identity Active Roles is very useful, though there are a few areas where it could be improved, such as the user interface, policy creation, and reporting; it requires good knowledge of Active Directory."
"One area that could be improved in One Identity Active Roles is the user interface and initial configuration process, as some advanced workflows and policy settings can be complex for new administrators."
"The initial setup and configuration can be complex, especially when designing workflows, policies, and delegation models."
"I have not seen a return on investment or any relevant metrics and I cannot imagine we would have saved any employees or any full-time equivalents for One Identity Active Roles."
"The third area for improvement, which is the weakest portion of ARS, is the workflow engine, which was introduced a few years ago. It's slow and not very intuitive to use, so I would like to see improvement there."
"Areas for improvement in One Identity Active Roles include UI modernization, workflow customization, flexibility in reporting, and troubleshooting visibility."
"One Identity Active Roles could be improved with better cloud-native management and SaaS options, simpler reporting, and easier customization."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"The licensing model is a simple user-based model, not that much complicated."
"It's expensive."
"It's fairly priced."
"The pricing is on the higher end."
"The pricing is high. I have not been involved with the renewal or cost aspect, but I know it is not cheap by any means. However, it is very useful for our environment."
"The price is reasonable. It costs us about 1 million Danish kroner annually, and we also spend about half as much on consultants."
"The pricing for Active Roles is expensive but not as expensive as other solutions like Okta."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Insurance Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Outsourcing Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business90
Midsize Enterprise18
Large Enterprise42
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Quest Change Auditor for Active Directory?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing was pretty straightforward. Actually, we bundled it with some other services offered from Quest to get a volume discount.
What needs improvement with Quest Change Auditor for Active Directory?
Change Auditor for Active Directory could be improved if the client were more flexible when installed, so if I upgrade the server, I wouldn't have to replace the clients at the same time. I think g...
What is your primary use case for Quest Change Auditor for Active Directory?
My main use case for Change Auditor for Active Directory is auditing changes, finding changes to undo, and break-fix solving issues. For example, I could give you a quick specific example of how I'...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for One Identity Active Roles?
The pricing, setup cost, and licensing for One Identity Active Roles are enterprise-oriented and typically based on the number of managed users or accounts. While setup requires moderate implementa...
What needs improvement with One Identity Active Roles?
One Identity Active Roles can be improved with a more modern user interface, better reporting and analytics capabilities, simplified workflow customization, improved troubleshooting tools, and stro...
What is your primary use case for One Identity Active Roles?
One Identity Active Roles serves as our centralized Active Directory administration platform for identity lifecycle management, including automated user provisioning, delegated administration, role...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Quest Active Roles
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

American Airlines, Bank of America, BARCLAYS, ebay, Ford, intel, MARS, MERCK, Microsoft, UBER, VISA
City of Frankfurt, Moore Public Schools, George Washington University, Transavia Airlines, Howard County, MD. See all stories at OneIdentity.com/casestudies
Find out what your peers are saying about Change Auditor for Active Directory vs. One Identity Active Roles and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
900,838 professionals have used our research since 2012.