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One Identity Safeguard vs Symantec Privileged Access Manager comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 6, 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

One Identity Safeguard
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
53
Ranking in other categories
User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (5th), Non-Human Identity Management (NHIM) (1st)
Symantec Privileged Access ...
Ranking in Privileged Access Management (PAM)
18th
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 March 2026, in the Privileged Access Management (PAM) category, the mindshare of One Identity Safeguard is 4.4%, up from 4.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec Privileged Access Manager is 1.6%, 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 (%)
One Identity Safeguard4.4%
Symantec Privileged Access Manager1.6%
Other94.0%
Privileged Access Management (PAM)
 

Featured Reviews

ST
Senior Information Technology Consultant at Helse Nord IKT
Centralized privileged access has improved control and now supports secure vendor billing oversight
The transparent mode is a seamless approach when using it. We have some issues with it, but we are working on it to make it work for us. Managing remote access for privileged users with the secure remote access feature is both easy and hard depending on the scenario we face. We have some systems that are easy and take not even a minute to set up, while others take a bit longer. We are in the middle of integrating One Identity Safeguard with the IGA solution, Identity Manager. We have some A2A setups, but it is not optimal. We are using RPA for developers, not actually RPA accounts, but that is something we are working on. We are also using the service account password rotation on the asset to some degree, and we are exploring options there. For integrating One Identity Safeguard, figuring out how password rotation works is a bit difficult because we have to make custom integrations. After that, it was no problem really. For the A2A use, it is not as easy as using something like HashiCorp's password management tools. It is mostly for certain features in One Identity Safeguard that I would like some improvements. Some of the things you can do in entitlements, there is a lot you can do there, but not everything is optimal. You have to have duplicates of a lot of things to make it work the way you want.
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

"The extensible framework for authentication is one of the most valuable features. We use an MFA plug-in and a lot of different factors, depending on what the business use-cases are. And of course, the auditing functionality is also valuable."
"The implementation time was quick. It was basically up and running within a week."
"The customer service and technical support are very good."
"One Identity Safeguard positively impacts our organization by reducing the likelihood of breaches from privileged sprawl by removing shared admin passwords and enforcing control checkouts while also improving our investigation times and providing strong forensics from a centralized location."
"The auditing and approval mechanisms are features we did not have before and are greatly appreciated."
"We use the Approval Anywhere, or cloud assistant feature and it is great. It enables us to add an extra layer of security for critical passwords without adding time to the approval process."
"All the features are promising, but we love the reporting feature because we can get each and every report. That's a major compliance requirement. Its reporting is really amazing, and it has made life a lot easier."
"All sessions are audited and they are indexed/searchable through the GUI."
"The agent-based credential management solution allows clients to programmatically use the agent to collect passwords during runtime from Symantec Privileged Access Manager."
"This application is very easy, fast, and trustworthy!"
"It has been reliable down the line with new features and updates."
"The most valuable feature is the general concept of securing privileged passwords."
"Now, all the privileged access is tunneled through PAM."
"The possibility to control the remote activity and establish different policies, because it depends on the position of workers, how much access they needed, and in what platforms they connect, and the possibility to separate this in an easy way is very useful."
"Monitoring privileged users’ actions is valuable because of the high level of trust and wide-ranging access insiders typically enjoy."
"It has simplified and unified the access of the users to a single point of access."
 

Cons

"The main point regarding the user experience is that Safeguard has two separate management consoles."
"For the A2A use, it is not as easy as using something like HashiCorp's password management tools."
"Our experience with technical support has been disappointing. We require more prompt and faster response times."
"We have feature requests and would like to see the turnaround times on those features to be faster."
"The interface is better now, but it still could be improved a lot. It needs more organization, menus, automatic refresh of information, and Web 2.0."
"The GUI has room for improvement because it is confusing and cumbersome."
"The SPS could be a lot easier to administrate and the parts should be unified, from a design perspective, so that I can recognize the systems as being part of the same package. They feel like they have been forced together."
"Monitoring of the platform should be easier and more functional so that you can have a clear picture of the running service."
"There are currently other tools on the market which are much cheaper than PAM. They can do almost all of what PAM does, and even do it better."
"The accessibility and other issues were big blockers for our customer: The local accounts with AD integration multi-tenant deployment Java installation on the local machines; those three elements were the biggest blockers for our project when we used it, and we were always putting out fires to do that."
"The response time for support could be faster. Some features should be added: cloud-based, VPN-less, more secure, and it should be adjusted in a hybrid environment."
"We experience stability issues after every patch upgrade."
"The product has not improved our organization."
"The management console could be improved."
"I wish it could create local accounts on desktops."
"We had some issues with the load balancing feature when configured for clustering."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"They have comparable pricing. All identity products are essentially priced in a similar way. It's a per-user base."
"One Identity Safeguard is expensive and the cost goes up as we scale."
"They offer a fair price for a robust solution."
"The license is very expensive for us, partly due to inflation and partly because of the exchange rate between the Dollar and the Iranian Rial. We purchased a perpetual license that we've been using up until now, but I believe that we are not going to update it in the future. Instead, we plan to find another third-party to support us with the license, in the sense that we would have access to their license as a shared agreement."
"We have a yearly license. The cost depends on how much a company wants to invest in technology. In our organization, we believe in modern digitization and automation processes so we found it affordable. One Identity was not that much less than other solutions and it is not a cheap solution. There were number of cheaper solutions. However, it's the most effective, according to our evaluation."
"The full license is expensive but if you plan to use it in a big organization then it is the best option because it is more flexible."
"The pricing depends on our perspective, our budget, and, of course, the competitors we are taking into account."
"It was definitely cheaper than the other two products that we evaluated."
"It is more expensive than other solutions on the market."
"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."
"I would prefer better licensing options for the 20-100 users we have at a given time."
"Pricing is fair compared to other top vendors."
"It is reasonably priced."
"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."
"They offer per-device, per-user, or monthly and yearly licensing models."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
University
12%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Marketing Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business33
Midsize Enterprise22
Large Enterprise20
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business14
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise30
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for One Identity Safeguard?
We have a separate department that studies setup costs for each product, but as far as my information goes, the pricing and setup costs are very good.
What needs improvement with One Identity Safeguard?
The most common improvement needed is for upgrades. One Identity Safeguard's desktop client should have a faster and easier upgrade process that ensures compatibility.
What is your primary use case for One Identity Safeguard?
One Identity Safeguard serves as our Privileged Access Management solution to enforce session management for administrators and allow them to access our systems in recorded sessions, which secures ...
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

No data available
CA PAM, Xceedium Xsuite, CA Privileged Access Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cavium
NEOVERA, Telesis, eSoft
Find out what your peers are saying about One Identity Safeguard vs. Symantec Privileged Access Manager and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,933 professionals have used our research since 2012.