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

Microsoft Defender for Identity vs Rapid7 InsightIDR comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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 Defender for Iden...
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) (5th), Microsoft Security Suite (3rd), Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) (3rd)
Rapid7 InsightIDR
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (14th), User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (5th), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (25th), Threat Deception Platforms (5th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (16th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Network Security Systems solutions, they serve different purposes. Microsoft Defender for Identity is designed for Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) and holds a mindshare of 15.4%, down 23.9% compared to last year.
Rapid7 InsightIDR, on the other hand, focuses on Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), holds 2.5% mindshare, down 2.6% since last year.
Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Defender for Identity15.4%
CrowdStrike Falcon15.6%
Microsoft Entra ID Protection12.2%
Other56.8%
Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR)
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Rapid7 InsightIDR2.5%
Wazuh10.9%
Splunk Enterprise Security9.3%
Other77.3%
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

Peter Arabomen - PeerSpot reviewer
Has supported hybrid identity management while integrating well with cloud directory services
The only challenge I have with Microsoft Defender for Identity is the latency. I may not put that entirely on Microsoft, because latency could be network related. At times when trying to authenticate, the prompt is delayed. We tried implementing passwordless authentication, especially for on-premises workloads, but we haven't been able to achieve that. Passwordless authentication is part of the identity functionalities, particularly when it comes to enforcing passwordless for on-premises workloads. In terms of improvements, you can't create OUs on Azure AD. Regarding giving users privileges on what they can do across different OUs, I haven't seen that feature on Microsoft Defender for Identity. Microsoft Defender for Identity needs to be able to plug into third-party applications that are not Microsoft. For instance, with a human resource application used to manage users and leave requests, when staff leaves the organization, they are first exited from that application before AD. Integration between Azure AD and third-party applications would allow automatic syncing when removing staff. The initial setup of Microsoft Defender for Identity is not hard. However, setup is one thing, and getting value from the application end-to-end is another. It can be set up and running from the first day but not functioning optimally. Initially, when we did the setup, it wasn't optimal. Over time, with continuous improvement, which we're still doing, we've gotten to a comfortable level, but there's still room for improvement.
Asim Naeem - PeerSpot reviewer
Providing comprehensive insight into alerts while working towards AI enhancement
I definitely recommend Rapid7 InsightIDR. It is becoming better, with improvements being continuously made to the product. Right now, I do not have any advice about Rapid7 for other users because every organization or user has different criteria or multiple use cases, so I refrain from commenting on that. I rate the overall solution seven out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The feature I like most is that you can create your own customized detection rules. It has a lot of default alerts and rules, but you can customize them according to your business needs."
"Defender for Identity has not affected the end-user experience."
"It automates routine testing and helps automate the finding of high-value alerts."
"Microsoft Defender for Identity provides excellent visibility into threats by leveraging real-time analytics and data intelligence."
"The most valuable aspect is its connection to Microsoft Sentinel and Defender for Endpoint, and giving exact timelines for incidents and when certain events occured during an incident."
"The best feature is security monitoring, which detects and investigates suspicious user activities. It can easily detect advanced attacks based on the behavior. The credentials are securely stored, so it reduces the risk of compromise. It will monitor user behavior based on artificial intelligence to protect the identities in your organization. It will even help secure the on-premise Active Directory. It syncs from the cloud to on-premise, and on-premise modifications will be reflected in the cloud."
"Auto-remediation is a valuable feature applied to Microsoft Defender for Identity, reducing the burden of investigating false positives."
"I would rate Microsoft Defender for Identity at nine out of ten."
"The web interface is great — very useful and user-friendly."
"During simulations or demonstrations, the tool generates alerts, providing details such as the specific application, its origin, and potential threats. For instance, it can identify if an application belongs to a known ransomware group. The system rates the threat, offering a clear detection ratio, such as 97 out of 100. It not only identifies threats but also illustrates the associated behaviors, helping us understand the potential risk to a particular endpoint."
"The log aggregation and storage provided by InsightIDR has shown no issues with scalability; aggregating over one hundred millions events daily."
"I rate Rapid7 nine out of 10 for affordability"
"​​User behavioral analytics allows us to pinpoint abnormal or suspicious behavior among millions of events every day."
"The biggest reason why we chose Rapid7 was to gain value in a really quick time. Its deployment doesn't take months. It just takes a few days."
"Another very important part of insightIDR is the ability to collect data from endpoint devices via agent software. With a large remote workforce, this allows visibility into the endpoints that are connected to the internet, but not to the corporate network."
"It improved my organization by building a security alerting program."
 

Cons

"The technical support needs significant improvement. Documentation for more minor issues in the form of guides or walkthroughs could help to resolve this issue. The number of tickets raised would decrease, removing some pressure from the support team and making it easier to clear the remaining tickets."
"The tracking instance needs to be configured appropriately."
"When the data leaves the cloud, there are security issues."
"One area that needs improvement is the number of alerts generated, leading to alert fatigue."
"Feedback on sync issues with the Microsoft portal highlighted its slow nature, with syncs sometimes taking eight hours."
"Fixing the solution isn't very seamless."
"One improvement I would recommend is the integration of an admin application within Teams, allowing easy access to attack information on a mobile platform to promptly alert affected users and their friends."
"And when you are working in a priority IP address, Identity is not able to know that those IPs are from the company. It sees that the IPs are from Taiwan or from Hong Kong or from India, even though they are internal IPs, resulting in a lot of false positives."
"InsightIDR is only available in a cloud version. Some of our customers prefer an on-prem solution because they want to manage the security within their environment."
"I would like to see more development in InsightIDR towards building their SIEM solution and converting it to XDR."
"One thing that springs to mind is easier API integration with ITSMs. We are evaluating a new ITSM and I would like to have InsightIDR create a ticket when an attack is identified, and the ticket would be closed in InsightIDR when the ITSM resolution is completed. This would take out the "single point of failure" we currently have, if the email recipient is somehow absent, in recording the risk appetite for the incident and the actions taken to mitigate or not."
"The APIs can be further improved in Rapid7."
"It takes time for the product's support team to resolve issues, making it an area of concern where improvements are required."
"The solution's XDR agents cannot compete with the XDR solutions out there yet."
"Currently, it lacks the functionalities provided by Rapid7's User Behavior Analytics (UBA)."
"Lacks a mobile application."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is costly, and we had multiple discussions with accounting to receive a discounted rate. However, on the open market, the tool is expensive."
"You won't be able to change your tenants from where you deploy them. For example, if you select Canada, they will charge you based on Canadian pricing. If you are also in London, when you deploy in Canada, the pound is higher than Canadian dollars, but your platform resources are billable in Canadian dollars. Using your pounds to pay for any of these things will be cheaper. Or, if you deploy in London, they will charge you based on your local currency."
"It is very affordable considering that other SIEM solutions are much more expensive and have many more licensing restrictions and fees."
"Microsoft Defender for Identity comes as part of the Microsoft E5 licensing stack."
"Defender for Identity is a little more expensive than other Microsoft products. Identity and Microsoft Defender for Cloud are both a bit costly."
"The solution has a mid-range price point in the market"
"The pricing is good, and it is not very expensive."
"It is a reasonably priced solution."
"I rate Rapid7 InsightIDR's price a four on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR charges us based on the endpoints we connect to."
"The pricing and licensing are competitive."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR is a cheaply priced product. On a scale of one to ten, where one is very expensive, and ten is very cheap, I rate the product's price at seven or eight."
"It is on a yearly basis. For our own company, for about 250 users, it was 16,000 euros a year."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) solutions are best for your needs.
867,497 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise14
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise6
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Identity?
Microsoft Defender for Identity provides excellent visibility into threats by leveraging real-time analytics and data intelligence.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Identity?
Microsoft can improve Microsoft Defender for Identity by ensuring that installation prerequisites are included in the setup process. Installing the solution presents challenges as numerous logs and...
What is your primary use case for Microsoft Defender for Identity?
My personal use case for Microsoft Defender for Identity is that it is amazing. It provides very good and deep analytics about whatever is happening in the on-premises Active Directory. The sensors...
What SOC product do you recommend?
For tools I’d recommend: -SIEM- LogRhythm -SOAR- Palo Alto XSOAR Doing commercial w/o both (or at least an XDR) is asking to miss details that are critical, and ending up a statistic. Also, rememb...
What do you like most about Rapid7 InsightIDR?
During simulations or demonstrations, the tool generates alerts, providing details such as the specific application, its origin, and potential threats. For instance, it can identify if an applicati...
 

Also Known As

Azure Advanced Threat Protection, Azure ATP, MS Defender for Identity
InsightIDR
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Defender for Identity is trusted by companies such as St. Luke’s University Health Network, Ansell, and more.
Liberty Wines, Pioneer Telephone, Visier
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Defender for Identity vs. Rapid7 InsightIDR and other solutions. Updated: July 2023.
867,497 professionals have used our research since 2012.