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Symantec Siteminder vs Symantec VIP Access Manager comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 11, 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

Symantec Siteminder
Ranking in Access Management
12th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
75
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (13th), Web Access Management (1st)
Symantec VIP Access Manager
Ranking in Access Management
17th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Authentication Systems (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Access Management category, the mindshare of Symantec Siteminder is 3.4%, up from 3.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Symantec VIP Access Manager is 1.7%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Access Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Symantec Siteminder3.4%
Symantec VIP Access Manager1.7%
Other94.9%
Access Management
 

Featured Reviews

Muzi Lubisi - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior technical Consultant at CA Africa
Improved user experience with seamless integration and easy installation
The feature that I mostly valued is the ease of installation on different systems, especially on Windows. Additionally, it is very beneficial for deploying single sign-on sessions between different windows on a web browser, provided I am connected to the right identity provider. That seamless integration significantly improves user experience and efficiency.
Berk Onur - PeerSpot reviewer
Presales Consultant at Cyberwise
With its mobile application, this tool offers a convenient and user-friendly experience to its users
To improve the tool, I think that the solution should consider integrations with other cybersecurity and IT technologies, such as Privileged Access Management and Site Integration. Additionally, the implementation of second-factor authentication via Symantec VIP Access Manager, CyberArk, and Delinea, among other technologies, could be best for the product. While the existing technology is okay, improving the integration capabilities for Symantec VIP Access Manager would benefit the product. I would like to see the solution meet the integration needs at our company. While many cybersecurity solutions can function independently, they often lack integration with our systems due to missed integration points. Improving the solution's integration feature would be beneficial.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has improved our user experience quite a bit because they can log in once and go to any application they want, as long as it is integrated with SiteMinder, which was not the case before."
"For us, it’s the best-of-breed pick on the market today."
"It's our single solution for managing user authentication."
"You definitely need to consider CA SSO; it is quite solid, it's never really gone down, and it's a well-understood and reliable piece of our enterprise."
"It has performed very well, it does what we need it to do, it's reliable, and it doesn't impose any overhead on the user or on the platform."
"We're able to have one single centralized way of logging in when you have shared sessions across all applications."
"Once we have our authentication and authorization policies set, they are easy to duplicate across all our applications instead of trying to develop them into each application individually."
"It helps protect our applications and provides identity management."
"It is a fast and easy solution for end users, and you are always online."
"Mostly from a product expert's point of view, it provides solutions for my clients."
"In this version 9.1, lots of changes are done for the dashboard, User Store etc."
"VIP is a strong, cloud-based authentication service that enables organizations to secure access to networks and applications to prevent unauthorized logins to company resources, even when passwords have been compromised or shared."
"Cloud-based service and management."
"Other than it provides us with remote access, so it's fairly easy to install, fairly easy to set up, and provides us the ability to get into our corporate environment."
"The ease of integrating into an existing authentication system."
"Pricing was about 25% of the old solution, saving us about $500,000 over three years for 10,000 users."
 

Cons

"We go by agents for authentication; anything relating to agent configuration could be improved, or even agentless security."
"If the reporting feature can be integrated into SSO itself that will be an icing on the cake."
"I used to get the runaround initially. They would ask us the same four questions all the time."
"It's stable, but we are finding some compatibility issues."
"I would give the technical support a rating of 2-3/10."
"In future releases, I would like to see maybe more capabilities with some more modern authentication."
"It was complex and not at all straightforward. They really need to work on this."
"There are certain integration points that can be leveraged and made more easy to deploy, like the REST APIs and things like that."
"At times, the relay server could not contact Symantec; it would fail open and allow access without a passcode."
"Every time that I have a new phone or computer, it takes a little longer to deploy it."
"The User Store synchronization part needs to improve. Also, the logs, reports, and dashboard can be improved."
"If they had dashboards or a report for managers or executives, then it would allow them to see the status and have it make sense to them."
"It gets out of sync with Active Directory or whatever it might be, whatever the authentication piece is on Active Directory, and they just reset it on the backend."
"In the next release, I would like the ability to work offline with remote access."
"Maybe Symantec could consider providing a step-by-step guide for first-time users."
"It is challenging to use when installing a new version."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I recommend conducting a PoC on every available product before choose one."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"Siteminder is a little costly. You pay for licensing, and they offer packages, so if you have less users, then you have to buy different products at different prices. If you have more of a user base, then the package is different. They also include other features—for example, if you have a database and you're using Siteminder, then it's good to use a Semantic-specific database, but if you are using less, then you have to purchase the database separately. Whereas if you are going for a bigger license, then it comes within the package. It depends on which plan you are using."
"Symantec Siteminder is expensive; they could definitely do better on the price."
"The price is quite comparable to the other enterprise-level solutions in that market."
"CA solutions are generally expensive but for the customer the ROI is big."
"The licensing is fair for this solution."
"The solution's pricing is competitive."
"Licensing and pricing seems very fair."
"There are additional costs for maintenance."
"I can say that the solution is worth the money."
"There is a one-time setup fee plus the licenses are provided as per the number of users. For SMS and voice calls, the costs are separate."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
24%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
Insurance Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise69
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise10
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Symantec Siteminder?
Symantec Siteminder needs to have adaptive authentication and multi-factor authentication as integrated features. Currently, multi-factor authentication is available as a separate solution, and it ...
What is your primary use case for Symantec Siteminder?
I deploy and support Symantec Siteminder ( /products/symantec-siteminder-reviews ). I have been a partner and reseller.
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Also Known As

SiteMinder, CA SSO, Layer7 SiteMinder
Symantec VIP
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

British Telecom, CoreBlox, DBS, HMS, Itera ASA and Simeo
Maine Medical Center, Aria S.p.A
Find out what your peers are saying about Symantec Siteminder vs. Symantec VIP Access Manager and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
896,202 professionals have used our research since 2012.