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Idira Privileged Access Manager vs Symantec Privileged Access Manager comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 2, 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

Idira Privileged Access Man...
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
230
Ranking in other categories
User Activity Monitoring (1st), Enterprise Password Managers (2nd), Mainframe Security (1st), Operational Technology (OT) Security (3rd)
Symantec Privileged Access ...
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
15th
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 2026, in the Privileged Access Management (PAM) category, the mindshare of Idira Privileged Access Manager is 8.6%, down from 16.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Privileged Access Manager is 1.9%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Privileged Access Management (PAM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Idira Privileged Access Manager8.6%
Symantec Privileged Access Manager1.9%
Other89.5%
Privileged Access Management (PAM)
 

Featured Reviews

Atul-Gujar - PeerSpot reviewer
CyberArk manager at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Secures critical infrastructures with essential user session audit records
A potential area for improvement is enhancing support for cluster environments and distributed Vaults. Clients in multiple countries that need central access have different challenges that require better solutions from CyberArk. For financial services, CyberArk can improve incident response by ensuring fast support for critical priority tickets to meet compliance requirements. Providing more documentation on CyberArk is recommended for new team members to enhance their troubleshooting capabilities. I understand it's up to the client, but 99% fail to change the demo key, so it's crucial for CyberArk to emphasize changing the key and documenting it as part of the installation process.
Muzi Lubisi - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior technical Consultant at CA Africa
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

"CyberArk has the ability to change the credentials on every platform."
"There are two main ways CyberArk Privileged Access Manager Server Control has been helpful to us."
"The benefit is knowing where your accesses are, who has access to what, and it provides improved security around having your credentials locked down and rotated regularly."
"It is a central repository. Therefore, if someone needs to access a server, then they go through CyberArk PAM. It provides a secure way to do this and CyberArk PAM records everything. For example, if you are connecting to a Linux server, then once you get into the Linux server and if it is integrated with CyberArk, it will automatically start recording everything that is being done. In most banks, seeing the recordings is very useful. If there are any gaps or something has happened which shouldn't have happened, then we can check the logs and videos. So, it gives security, in a robust manner, to the organization."
"For a while, there were individual IDs having privileged access. We wanted to restrict that. We implemented the solution so that it can be more of internal control. We can have session recordings happening and reduce our attacks."
"The solution is very stable."
"CyberArk Privileged Access Manager has helped our organization by controlling users' access."
"Every aspect of the solution is very well integrated, and that gives comfort because it is a fail-safe kind of environment."
"The system is very stable."
"The most important feature is that we do not need to know the passwords any more; just having access to the end point; and that it’s easy to manage users and the account."
"Password Management and Session Recording. The simplicity and ease that it is to be up and running out-of-the-box is very much appreciated."
"I like the fact that passwords are checked-in automatically."
"The agent-based credential management solution allows clients to programmatically use the agent to collect passwords during runtime from Symantec Privileged Access Manager."
"The DB clustering is a really good benefit of using CA PAM."
"The reason we chose CA PAM is it worked in the scenarios that we wanted it to, and it just worked without problems."
"Transparent login and cluster synchronization are quite stable compared with other products, and it is easy to manage for the administrator."
 

Cons

"Technical support from the vendor is the worst and that is one reason I stopped using CyberArk."
"The solution should be able to mitigate internal threats"
"There are some options in the web portal where they can improve the user experience. For example, in remote, there is a parameter called 'access to remote machine.' When we put host names in that field, we are not able to search it. It"
"One area for improvement is the user interface. It needs significant enhancements."
"Sometimes, they are a hindrance, when you know you have been through the issue again, and they want to gather the same log files, start from the basics, and we already know we are past that."
"Enhanced PSM support for Java based applications."
"They are sometimes not flexible with things. For instance, from one day to another, there might be something that had been done years ago by CyberArk, then they say, "We do not support that." You then have to initiate a complaint and start working with them. Things might become complicated and months pass while you are working with them. Usually, they are good and fast, but sometimes they seem to be blocked with problems, e.g., you will suddenly be working with another team instead of the team that you were working with the day before."
"The authentication port is available in CyberArk Alero but not Fortinet products."
"We have encountered stability issues at various software and hardware versions, but we worked with the support team to quickly stabilize our environment."
"The integration with AS/400 Endpoint via Transparent Login could be better and useful for some users."
"They need to have zero tier and active-active setup ​with zero minimum downtime, which they are working on it. ​"
"I wish it could create local accounts on desktops."
"Technical support is average. They took a long time to provide good answers, only recommended to upgrade SW version which in some environments is not an option and they don’t even know if that will fix the problem."
"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."
"The product has not improved our organization."
"The setup was complex."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing for CyberArk Privileged Access Manager is quite expensive, and the pricing varies from region to region. In APAC, CyberArk Privileged Access Manager can be obtained for less than in North America, according to my understanding."
"This solution is considered to be more expensive than others out there on the market today."
"It is in line with its competitors, but all such solutions cost too much money."
"The price of this solution is quite reasonable."
"I haven't seen the numbers. I know it is not cheap, but I don't know what it is. I would rate it a six out of ten in terms of pricing. It is definitely more expensive than the other product, but it also provides more functionality, and it is modular too. So, we pay for the functionality we're actually going to use, and that's nice."
"I believe that this solution is priced well. It's the market leader and I think that it's the best solution."
"This solution is expensive."
"This product is very expensive."
"Appliances are relatively cheap, don’t skimp. Make sure you have redundancy, high availability, and enough appliances to manage the concurrent workload."
"The licensing is simple and scalable."
"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."
"Cost-wise, CA was better compared to others in the market. ​"
"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."
"The prices are not low, but one can ask for a discount. It’s not the cheapest PAM solution."
"Pricing is fair compared to other top vendors."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Construction Company
7%
Outsourcing Company
18%
Construction Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business59
Midsize Enterprise42
Large Enterprise175
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise30
 

Questions from the Community

How does Sailpoint IdentityIQ compare with CyberArk PAM?
We evaluated Sailpoint IdentityIQ before ultimately choosing CyberArk. Sailpoint Identity Platform is a solution to manage risks in cloud enterprise environments. It automates and streamlines the m...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?
My thoughts on the pricing of CyberArk Privileged Access Manager depend entirely on the vendors' requirements. If they want their things to be secure, they have to spend accordingly. We have four t...
What needs improvement with CyberArk Privileged Access Manager?
I believe account discovery and rolling support need to be improved. Account discovery is important when integrating with other systems, as other PAM solutions can perform account discovery and onb...
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...
What is your primary use case for Symantec Privileged Access Manager?
With the customers that I have so far, I help them broker RDP sessions to sensitive servers, particularly those that manage aspects like physical access. I have also done it for backend databases, ...
 

Also Known As

CyberArk Privileged Access Security, CyberArk Enterprise Password Vault
CA PAM, Xceedium Xsuite, CA Privileged Access Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Rockwell Automation
NEOVERA, Telesis, eSoft
Find out what your peers are saying about Idira Privileged Access Manager vs. Symantec Privileged Access Manager and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
911,549 professionals have used our research since 2012.