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LastPass vs Microsoft Active Directory comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

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
5.5
Users experienced positive ROI with LastPass by increasing productivity, reducing support calls, and improving security through streamlined password management.
Sentiment score
8.8
Microsoft Active Directory offers high ROI, efficient user access control, and centralized management, enhancing organizational productivity and cost-effectiveness.
The solution is really time-saving since I don't need to create users in each server or system manually, and user access control is streamlined.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
5.0
LastPass customer service is mixed, with positive comments on quick help, but issues with contact difficulty and email support.
Sentiment score
5.9
Microsoft Active Directory support varies, with slow responses, costly premium help, mixed experiences, and reliance on external resources.
Support documents are available on the internet in every language.
Sometimes support takes long to engage and resolve, extending over weeks or even months.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.2
LastPass efficiently manages passwords for businesses, integrates seamlessly with devices, and offers strong multi-user management despite minor performance dips.
Sentiment score
7.0
Microsoft Active Directory scales well for small and large businesses, with Azure suggested for extreme scalability and integration ease.
Microsoft Active Directory scales effectively; I don't foresee any issues with that at all.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
6.6
Users praise LastPass for its reliability, security features, cross-platform performance, and efficient autofill, despite occasional minor glitches.
Sentiment score
7.8
Microsoft Active Directory is stable and reliable, with high satisfaction despite minor bugs and occasional patch issues.
With multiple domain controllers, stability is ensured.
I've been working with Microsoft Active Directory for over 3 years, and we've had no problems.
 

Room For Improvement

Users criticized LastPass for slow performance, sync issues, security concerns, poor customer service, and an outdated design.
Active Directory needs a user-friendly interface, better integration, security upgrades, and improved cloud synchronization for enhanced usability.
Sometimes, it can be overly complicated, and when you apply Group Policy in an Active Directory environment, sometimes those settings apply and sometimes they don't.
Exporting and verifying group memberships require command line scripts, which isn't simple.
There are some features that need improvements in terms of ease of use and frequency of updates.
 

Setup Cost

<p>LastPass offers affordable plans for Teams and Enterprises, praised for security, user management, performance, and customer support.</p>
Microsoft Active Directory offers affordable licensing, often bundled, with Azure cloud reducing costs by eliminating server fees.
The pricing, setup cost, and licensing with Microsoft Active Directory is straightforward; you just buy the server and then have to buy the user CALs.
 

Valuable Features

Users praise LastPass for its strong security, password management, autofill, cross-device sync, and business features like shared folders and admin controls.
Microsoft Active Directory offers seamless Azure integration, user-friendly management, and scalability, enhancing network efficiency and usability for large organizations.
Having active deployment and well-configured systems helps me manage tasks and easily oversee thousands of users.
Permissions can be granted to a group or specific folder with one or two clicks in Active Directory.
I can control all the devices in my domain by just changing the group policies in one place.
 

Categories and Ranking

LastPass
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
22nd
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Password Managers (17th), AIOps (29th)
Microsoft Active Directory
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
7th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
Active Directory Management (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of LastPass is 1.1%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Active Directory is 3.0%, up from 2.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

Featured Reviews

MK
Straightforward to set up, good support, intuitive to use, and offers good value for the cost
The most valuable feature is being able to use a single master password to access all of your other passwords. One feature that is really important to us is the ability to create secure notes. In our scenario, these are notes such as how to get some of our devices on the network. They are processes and procedures that we don't want anybody else to see, especially within the IT department. It's a small department and we have very many processes that we use, but not on a daily basis, so we aren't going to remember them. By using LastPass and secure notes, we can go back to those notes in a secure fashion and remind ourselves how to do certain things. For instance, how to create a test database for accounting, which is something that we do once a year. We don't want that to be out in a non-secure fashion, where somebody in the public can see it.
Roberta Politano - PeerSpot reviewer
Has good authentication features
The solution's group policy is a normal way to deploy configuration and helps deploy to a wider environment. The solution is deployed both on-premises and on the cloud. I would recommend the solution to other users based on their infrastructure. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.
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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Single Sign-On (SSO) solutions are best for your needs.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
University
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Educational Organization
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What do you like most about Microsoft Active Directory?
The solution is easy to install and has good reliability.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Active Directory?
Technology is evolving. AI is offering solutions. However, short-term fixes are like band-aids.
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Active Directory?
I utilize it in almost every scenario. I use the Hazer database and meet daily needs across every industry, every time.
 

Also Known As

LastPass Business, LastPass Enterprise, Lastpasss
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Deakin University, Duke University, Code.org, Influitive, PeopleKeys, SMA Technologies, Skynamo
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about LastPass vs. Microsoft Active Directory and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.