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Microsoft Active Directory vs Red Hat Single Sign On 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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Microsoft Active Directory
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
8th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
47
Ranking in other categories
Active Directory Management (5th)
Red Hat Single Sign On
Ranking in Single Sign-On (SSO)
11th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Single Sign-On (SSO) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Active Directory is 3.2%, up from 2.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Red Hat Single Sign On is 2.1%, down 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%
Red Hat Single Sign On2.1%
Other94.7%
Single Sign-On (SSO)
 

Featured Reviews

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.
Giovanni Baruzzi - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable and flexible solution with some basic capabilities
I set up Red Hat Single Sign-On in half an hour. I had to install a single sign-on solution for a customer. I reviewed a list of all available products, which were no more than fifty, and analyzed them. I chose it because it was convincing, modern, and based on technology from 2015. I put my trust in this product, and after nine years, I feel confident in my decision. Deploying this solution usually takes half an hour. You need an operating system running, then deploy the packages and prepare the interfaces. I rate the initial setup a ten out of ten, where one is difficult and ten is easy.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Technical support is helpful."
"The solution is easy to install and has good reliability."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is authentication."
"One noteworthy aspect we discovered is the ability to exercise tight control over systems, specifically Windows PCs. This pertains to the management of policies, usage patterns, and user access on these devices, particularly within the framework of Active Directory which is extremely well thought. This actually works better with on-premises solutions. However, as the global trend shifts towards cloud and hybrid environments, Active Directory and its use is diminishing. Yet, it hasn't entirely lost its relevance and remains a presence that cannot be entirely disregarded."
"It is a stable solution."
"One advantage of Active Directory is that you can sync it with Microsoft Office 365, so you can manage on-premise and cloud operations, which can have different requirements. The flexibility of a hybrid management solution is valuable."
"The features and capabilities of Microsoft Active Directory that I have found the most valuable over the years are that it is a mature technology, it's stable, and it delivers what it promises."
"These Group Policies provide enhancement, helping to reduce administrative overhead and enhance productivity."
"It is very easy to scale and use as you want."
"The product’s most valuable feature is its ability to assign only one password for the user at a false value."
"Good support for single sign-on protocols."
"Red Hat SSO integrates well with our other solutions. Using OIDC protocols and ITL integration, employees can authenticate with Red Hat SSO and access our microservices."
"Red Hat SSO has a lot of very concise, well laid out documentation, which is available in the free edition as well."
"The solution is flexible and has the same basic capabilities right out of the box. The most important feature of this product is that it is a Red double-sided product. One side is a well-known open-source project; the other is a Red Hat commercial product. The commercial product benefits from all the experience and contributions of the community, making it a very well-developed product."
 

Cons

"In my experience, it's difficult to manage Microsoft Active Directory when the server is attacked by a threat or malware."
"The technical support team does not give prompt responses."
"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."
"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."
"The solution should maintain the infrastructure according to the period you are in and the security changes."
"Short-term fixes are like band-aids."
"The interface hasn't changed much over the years. It's suitable for my tastes, but that doesn't mean everybody likes it."
"Microsoft Active Directory restricts most of the features our company's employees want to use since they are involved in research and development activities."
"Red Hat SSO's architecture could be updated."
"Security could be improved."
"The product’s technical support services could be better."
"Red Hat publishes much more and communicates its actions and plans. They could provide words, maps, and other resources."
"They could provide more checks and balances to find out if there have been any security lapses, e.g., if somebody is trying to break into the system. Some other products have these detection mechanisms in case someone is trying to hack into the system or find out a user's passwords."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Active Directory is built-in into Microsoft Windows 10. I'm not an administrator and would not be involved in purchasing decisions for new versions of the software. I have only used the client portion of it, I do not know if there is a cost to using the solution."
"I'm unsure about the cost of the solution, as I was never involved in that aspect. However, I don't think it would be expensive. It might be average, around four or five out of ten."
"We have to purchase a license for the solution."
"Its price is reasonable."
"The solution is based on a licensing model."
"I rate the product’s pricing a five out of ten."
"We purchase the license for the solution on a yearly basis."
"It's not overly expensive. It's considered a base function by Microsoft."
"If you want support, that is when you use the paid version. There are different support categories that you can pay for, which provide different support levels. E.g., there is a quick response if you pay a higher amount, where the response time is within a few hours."
"It is a low cost product. This product can be used by non-profit organizations or universities, when they don't want to invest a lot of money."
"The license is around $8000 USD."
"Red Hat Single Sign On is expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
11%
Healthcare Company
7%
Government
19%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise20
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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 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 ...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Active Directory?
My usual use case for Microsoft Active Directory is to share groups of authorization among many different applications. The other use case for Microsoft Active Directory is the authentication of us...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Red Hat Single Sign On?
I rate the product’s pricing a five out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive.
What needs improvement with Red Hat Single Sign On?
Red Hat publishes much more and communicates its actions and plans. They could provide words, maps, and other resources. Scalability could be improved, too. It could provide more documentation.
What is your primary use case for Red Hat Single Sign On?
Earlier, customers used to authenticate the user before they used the application. With the help of Single Sign On, the customer logs in and uses all of the customer's applications without authenti...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Red Hat Single Sign-On, Red Hat SSO, RH SSO, RH-SSO
 

Overview

Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Active Directory vs. Red Hat Single Sign On and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.