Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

LastPass Business vs Microsoft Active Directory comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 27, 2025

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
5.0
Microsoft Active Directory enhances productivity by streamlining user management and access control, providing significant time and cost savings.
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
Enterprise users experience prompt responses but face reliability and communication issues, with inconsistent technical assistance and access management challenges.
Sentiment score
5.7
Microsoft Active Directory support quality varies; users experience mixed results influenced by representatives' skills and response times.
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
Opinions on LastPass Business scalability vary, with performance issues and feature needs cited alongside successful integrations and permissions.
Sentiment score
6.0
Microsoft Active Directory is scalable, adaptable for diverse users, and effective for organizations of all sizes with Azure integration.
Microsoft Active Directory scales effectively; I don't foresee any issues with that at all.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
6.6
LastPass Business is generally reliable despite occasional stability issues, with two-factor authentication enhancing security and accessibility.
Sentiment score
6.2
Microsoft Active Directory is stable and reliable, with high ratings, minor issues, praised scalability, and requires proactive growth planning.
I've been working with Microsoft Active Directory for over 3 years, and we've had no problems.
With multiple domain controllers, stability is ensured.
 

Room For Improvement

LastPass Business struggles with inefficiencies in resource management, security features, and user functionality, prompting calls for enhanced capabilities.
Microsoft Active Directory requires improved integration, security, synchronization, usability, scalability, and support to better serve organizational needs.
There are some features that need improvements in terms of ease of use and frequency of updates.
This is catastrophic if you have to integrate other applications that use the same standard.
Microsoft Active Directory Federation Services is very difficult for on-premises solutions, while for the cloud solution, it's very easy.
 

Setup Cost

Enterprise buyers have mixed views on LastPass Business pricing due to recent increases, but appreciate flexibility and holistic value.
Active Directory costs differ by organization, often moderate to high, with cloud solutions like Azure reducing expenses for some.
For the cloud solution in our region, the pricing of Microsoft Active Directory is very high.
I consider Microsoft Active Directory expensive because if you buy this thing bundled with the Windows Directory Server, you get five user licenses for about a thousand euros, or a little bit less than this.
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

LastPass Business offers extensive password management features emphasizing security, user friendliness, and integrations for efficient enterprise use.
Microsoft Active Directory provides integration, scalability, access control, and security, making it vital for large organizations seeking efficient management.
One valuable feature is the centralized creation of IDs.
I can control all the devices in my domain by just changing the group policies in one place.
Having active deployment and well-configured systems helps me manage tasks and easily oversee thousands of users.
 

Categories and Ranking

LastPass Business
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
23rd
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Password Managers (18th), AIOps (33rd)
Microsoft Active Directory
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
8th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
46
Ranking in other categories
Active Directory Management (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of LastPass Business is 1.5%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Active Directory is 3.2%, up from 2.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Single Sign-On (SSO) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Active Directory3.2%
LastPass Business1.5%
Other95.3%
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.
Giovanni Baruzzi - PeerSpot reviewer
Mature technology delivers consistent capability and enhances centralized user management
I think Microsoft Active Directory could be more intuitive. My impression of the integration of Microsoft Active Directory with third-party applications is that it can be made better. It's not the tendency of Microsoft to use a standard, but to modify it to their needs. This is catastrophic if you have to integrate other applications that use the same standard. This creates a major problem, so you have to be very careful and implement step by step, knowing that the partner is Microsoft. I would leave Microsoft Active Directory as it is and build possibly interfaces. For example, there is a provisioning protocol standard named SCIM. It seems that Microsoft Active Directory does not yet have a SCIM interface, which is a problem.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Single Sign-On (SSO) solutions are best for your needs.
867,341 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
9%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Retailer
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise20
 

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?
I haven't explored all the features of Microsoft Active Directory yet, as I'm still learning and exploring all the options within the platform. There is one minor improvement I can suggest. Sometim...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Active Directory?
I use Microsoft Active Directory when I need to perform password resets, account unlocks, add users to groups, create users, disable accounts, set account expirations, check memberships, or add lic...
 

Also Known As

LastPass Enterprise, Lastpasss Teams
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 Business vs. Microsoft Active Directory and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
867,341 professionals have used our research since 2012.