Okta’s Single Sign-On Makes App Access Seamless and Efficient
What do you like best about the product?
What I like best about Okta is the single pane of glass that brings all of our applications into one place. It lets me move almost seamlessly between tools with one sign-on, which makes day-to-day work much faster and less disruptive. One of the biggest upsides is not having to constantly reach for my phone for a 2FA code every few minutes. That reduction in login friction saves time, keeps me focused, and makes access to business applications much more efficient.
What do you dislike about the product?
The biggest downsides to Okta are the complexity of some integrations and the way costs can scale. While many integrations are solid, others can take significant effort to configure correctly. Pricing can also climb quickly as more users are added, which affects long-term ROI. It is also disappointing that service or admin accounts are not provided gratis, since those accounts are often necessary for ongoing platform management.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Before using Okta, managing access across multiple applications was more manual and gave us less visibility into who had access to what. Okta solved that by centralizing identity, access, and offboarding in one place. Now we can quickly remove a user and cut off access to connected systems as soon as they leave, which has improved security and reduced the risk of former employees retaining access. The biggest benefit for us is better visibility and faster access management, especially during offboarding, which is now much more consistent and efficient.
Seamless Single Sign-On Across Multiple Apps
What do you like best about the product?
The ability to have a single sign on across multiple software
What do you dislike about the product?
I’m a fan of using Okta and the SSO it provides.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I like being able to avoid having users type their passwords for 10 different software applications across the network.
Strong authentication has improved secure access for cloud apps, APIs, and hybrid environments
What is our primary use case?
As part of Identity and Access Management solutions, or IAM, that many organizations use, Okta Platform is a mature cloud-first IAM platform that uses many single sign-on methods. This is one use case for applications, along with MFA and federation across SaaS and custom applications.
Okta Platform helps to secure access to cloud environments, APIs, containerized workloads, and AI/GenAI services in my architecture by allowing me to create the application in Okta Platform and assign it to the right users and groups, then start configuring the authentication. The first step is multi-factor authentication, which helps secure that only the approved users and groups are allowed to use that application, whether it's an AI application or an on-premise organization application. Another important measure to avoid attackers from gaining users' credentials, such as passwords, involves single sign-on. Additionally, Okta Platform has an adaptive access policy, meaning the user, or employee in this case, does not need to remember the password. Once the administrator configures SSO, the user does not need to go through password authentication; if they are authenticated using MFA, it works directly.
The use of Okta Platform to protect non-human identities in my environment, such as service accounts, machine-to-machine access, or AI agents, is limited since in the organization I work for at Deloitte, we use Microsoft for that. Okta Platform is a great IAM solution, but it is not an IGA solution, short for Identity Governance. The first thing an organization needs to look at is to understand their use case: do they need IAM or IGA or do they only need IAM? Because if it's only IAM, Okta Platform is good, but if they also need IGA to govern non-human identities and others, it is not a solution for that.
Okta Platform helps to address specific industry or regulatory requirements such as healthcare and financial services in my cloud environment. For instance, it benefits the banking industry and the e-commerce industry as well. However, it is available for many industries because it's a very mature and cloud-first IAM platform, making it perfect for companies or startups that are just starting out; they don't need to go through on-premise setups.
What is most valuable?
What I like about Okta Platform includes its large, pre-built application integration catalog, which is very useful. It also has strong support for the SAML standard and OpenID, commonly referred to as OIDC. Additionally, it offers good API and extensibility for custom use cases and works well in hybrid and multi-cloud environments.
The main benefits that Okta Platform brings to the table include strong authentication, which is the first thing, and adaptive MFA, which is very good. For example, if someone tries to log in from a country that is different from the countries they typically sign into, then Okta Platform will ask them to perform another authentication to verify that it is, in fact, the same user. Strong authentication is crucial, along with federation that I used for both cloud and on-premise systems. Federation worked very well, and it facilitates fast SaaS onboarding, with application templates in Okta Platform which make the whole configuration easier. Coming from a Microsoft background, I appreciate how Okta Platform is vendor-agnostic, meaning you do not need to depend on anything; it can work with any identity or identity governance vendor.
I noticed measurable security and operational improvements in my cloud-based workloads since implementing Okta Platform. It is very stable; we didn't have many errors when it came to users trying to log in, which is the first thing. Federation also worked, and that's one use case I can say I used it for. I had a client that was an organization with over 5,000 employees, and they wanted the authentication to go for Microsoft, but through Okta Platform. In reality, what happens is the user tries to log into an Okta Platform application and then gets redirected to Microsoft. That is federation, which refers to redirecting them to a Microsoft page. Once they complete the right authentication, they are redirected back to Okta Platform, making it a successful use case for a large organization in the insurance industry.
What needs improvement?
While there are many good things about Okta Platform, I would like to see improvements, especially in the IGA capabilities, which are limited compared to more dedicated IGA tools. I believe adding this would give them a real benefit. Additionally, it is not designed as a privileged access management solution, referred to as PAM. As I come from a Microsoft background, I see that Microsoft has both IGA and PAM capabilities, which Okta Platform lacks. Another area for improvement is pricing; it becomes complex and expensive when you add features. I would like to see licensing transparency, possibly some cost control notifications. Lastly, better policy visualization would be nice to have, showing how the policies configured can be represented more visually.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with Okta Platform for the past year.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
When it comes to scalability, I find that Okta Platform's performance is very good. That's the whole point. As soon as you scale up, it often comes with additional costs, but that worked perfectly for us. We managed to implement it for a large organization with many users, so there was no problem; it was very stable.
How are customer service and support?
I would evaluate customer service and technical support for Okta Platform by noting that we did need assistance once when we blocked ourselves out and had to contact Okta Platform support. It took about two days for them to respond, which I think is reasonable. However, this also depends on the support license that you have. We had the minimum one, but still, two days is acceptable as they helped us resolve the issue.
How was the initial setup?
My experience with the deployment of Okta Platform is that the initial setup is straightforward for standard use cases such as fast SSO and MFA. However, complex environments such as hybrid AD, custom applications, or lifecycle automation require careful design and skilled implementation to avoid the technical debt that's often referenced.
What was our ROI?
Regarding the pricing of Okta Platform, while it is high and complex, I find it does bring a return on investment. The important thing is for companies to evaluate the total cost and not just the base licensing because once you add more features, the total cost increases. This evaluation varies based on the organization's use case; if it's below around 100,000 users, it should be fine. However, if you plan to go beyond that, evaluating the total cost becomes crucial.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
I decided to switch to Okta Platform for different use cases for different organizations, particularly at Deloitte. We noticed that many of these organizations that are very Microsoft-heavy, meaning they have many products with Microsoft, find that Microsoft Entra ID, which is an IAM and IGA solution, fits them perfectly because they are already in that Microsoft ecosystem. However, for organizations that are not heavily involved with Microsoft, then Okta Platform is a great solution because they do not need to be dependent on any vendor. It's cloud-first, and so if you need specific IAM without being tied to Microsoft, I think Okta Platform is the best alternative.
What other advice do I have?
Given my experience with Okta Platform and with other technologies, my advice to other organizations considering it is to clearly define if they want IAM versus IGA requirements as early as possible. Okta Platform is not a full IGA platform, and organizations need to understand that coming in. They should also evaluate the total cost and not just the base licensing. Lastly, if they are Microsoft-heavy organizations, they might consider Microsoft Entra ID, but if they are not deeply tied to Microsoft, then definitely go with Okta Platform. I would rate my overall experience with Okta Platform as an eight out of ten.
Identity platform has unified access, automated lifecycle tasks, and strengthened cloud security
What is our primary use case?
I have been using Okta Platform for almost four years. In my current organization, I use Okta Platform as a cloud-based IAM platform for purposes like Single Sign-On, multi-factor authentication, lifecycle management, as well as for universal directories. It provides secure, automated user provisioning and access to applications for employers and customers, and it is also useful for risk authentication and API access management. Okta Platform is an AI-driven technology that detects threat-related models, signaling if anything potentially harmful might occur. Thus, there are various uses for Okta Platform.
Okta Platform protects non-human identities in my environment, including service accounts, machine-to-machine access, and AI agents. Regarding non-human identity protection, the ServiceNow team creates a non-human identity that flows into Okta Platform and generates a generic password for them. It helps manage our service accounts and includes customization features that enable these non-human identities to automatically activate their passwords every 60 days and restrict logins to approved systems only, not from personal or any other devices.
Okta Platform helps to address specific industry and regulatory requirements in my cloud environment, including usage within the banking sector, finance sector, and one of the large logistics sectors. We also have a client in the pharmacy sector where we use Okta Platform as a complete end-to-end product.
For Okta Platform deployment model, I am using AWS. I have integrated and secured AWS services through Okta Platform by utilizing Single Sign-On for application integration and using Terraform for project deployments.
What is most valuable?
The best features of Okta Platform include Single Sign-On, which offers one-click access for thousands of cloud and on-premise applications, and great lifecycle management. It automates user provisioning and de-provisioning, managing the entire identity lifecycle from onboarding to offboarding. Additionally, it provides excellent scalability along with device and administrative tools management, making Single Sign-On and lifecycle management the standout features.
Using Okta Platform, we can utilize almost 7,000 pre-built integrations with popular applications. It provides easy and customizable configuration based on client requirements, allowing for development of user onboarding, offboarding, and updating processes. There are numerous API features, including passwordless authentication and B2B customer identity with a CIAM feature. Okta Platform secures APIs to control access and protect sensitive data, enabling users to reset passwords or unlock accounts without IT intervention. Moreover, it offers standard and custom reports to monitor access, ensuring compliance and visibility into potential security risks.
Okta Platform helps to secure access to cloud infrastructure, APIs, containerized workloads, or AI/GenAI services in my architecture by utilizing two modules: Identity Threat Protection (ITP) and identity governance and automation. ITP analyzes login patterns, device posture, and network data to detect anomalous activity, and it enables universal logout for instant revocation of access tokens across all supported applications if suspicious behavior is detected. The shared signals framework, along with Log Investigator and natural language processing, allows admins to query system logs in plain English for quicker investigations. In terms of identity governance and automation, it analyzes user roles and activity to recommend the least privileged access, optimizing governance policies and generating summaries of user access rights for access certification reviews.
What needs improvement?
While I see very few areas for improvement in Okta Platform, I do note its high cost, which can be particularly challenging for smaller organizations looking to utilize advanced features like Okta Workflows. Additionally, there are reporting limitations, as some users find Okta Platform's built-in reports less detailed compared to competitors. Furthermore, frequent multi-factor authentication prompts can cause MFA fatigue, disrupting user experience. Lastly, there is limited on-premise support, which, while robust in the cloud, is often expensive to manage for legacy on-premise applications, making these features candidates for enhancement.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Okta Platform for almost four years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
In terms of stability, I faced some issues in 2022, but for the last three years, there have been no scalability problems. Okta Platform efficiently supports scalability, allowing for extensive individual tenants within a single environment, as well as onboarding and offboarding processes for thousands of applications. Clients can scale their API access requests beyond default limits, which is adaptable according to requirements without impacting performance or deployment.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
In terms of stability, I faced some issues in 2022, but for the last three years, there have been no scalability problems. Okta Platform efficiently supports scalability, allowing for extensive individual tenants within a single environment, as well as onboarding and offboarding processes for thousands of applications. Clients can scale their API access requests beyond default limits, which is adaptable according to requirements without impacting performance or deployment.
How are customer service and support?
I would rate Okta Platform's tech support and customer service as an eight out of ten, as their availability can be rare and requires scheduled calls, often taking a significant time to receive solutions. However, the support provided is generally very good.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Before adopting Okta Platform, I had used OneLogin and Entra ID for identity and access management, specifically for privileged access.
How was the initial setup?
The deployment experience with Okta Platform varies based on client requirements. For large-scale applications, it took almost two to three months, while small-scale organizations required around six to seven days. I have not faced issues during deployment; it has consistently met our clients' expectations.
What about the implementation team?
For deployment, our AWS DevOps team works on the deployment-related aspects and supports the workloads secured by Okta Platform.
What was our ROI?
Since implementing Okta Platform, I have noticed measurable security and operational improvements in our cloud-based workloads. Initially, we faced complex implementation challenges, but now it supports much faster and easier implementation and deployment in production, thanks to AI utilization. We resolved earlier centralized risks, and credentials are now managed in a very encrypted manner, which has improved performance and security.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I find Okta Platform cost-effective and worthwhile to purchase due to its vendor-neutral nature, supporting thousands of pre-built integrations with third-party applications. It is highly flexible with adaptive MFA, includes user behavior analytics and custom workflows, which many competitors do not offer. Its granular and easily configurable policy engine, along with a strong lifecycle management process, makes it worthy of investment for any organization despite its cost.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
I evaluated OneLogin and Entra ID before choosing Okta Platform.
What other advice do I have?
My advice for organizations considering Okta Platform is that if cost is not a concern, they should definitely opt for it, as it features excellent user lifecycle management, identity governance, re-certification, user provisioning, and strong Single Sign-On functionalities. I would rate this review as a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Centralized identity has improved secure training access and simplifies global user management
What is our primary use case?
Our company is an educational training platform operating as a global online training model. We focus on IT services and training, managing global employees and user accounts while handling the onboarding and offboarding process. We specifically use Okta Platform to manage MFA, SSO, and logins for multiple applications. It is integral to our identity and access management strategy, effectively centralizing our application management. We opted for Okta Platform because we wanted a separate, unique platform solely dedicated to identity management, unlike Microsoft Azure, where additional interconnections like Entra ID and Intune might be required.
What is most valuable?
Okta Platform offers valuable features such as centralized identity and access management, which allow for a single sign-on process, simplifying user authentication across applications. Its scalable management solutions provide strong multi-factor authentication, integrating easily with various applications using protocols like SAML, OAuth, and OpenID Connect. An intuitive admin interface makes user roles and access policies easy to manage, enhancing overall operational efficiency and security.
Security improvements are notable, with centralized identity control and reduced IT workload through automation. Okta Platform supports onboarding and offboarding employees, improving user experience with fewer logins needed.
Overall security posture with adaptive multi-factor authentication centralizes access control, especially benefiting hybrid and multi-cloud environments. Smooth deployment and scalability eliminate lag, providing seamless and stable operations in managing user accounts and identities.
What needs improvement?
Okta Platform's pricing model can be expensive for smaller organizations, affecting user feature accessibility. Initial setup and configuration require careful planning and experience from administrators. Cloud-based infrastructure may lead to access issues during downtime or service disruptions. Support response time could be improved, especially for non-premium customers.
Pricing could be more competitive compared to alternatives like Ping Identity, OneLogin, and Microsoft Azure AD. More responsive customer service, enhancements in setup configuration, and support could improve the platform. Prioritizing customer issues in support tickets based on urgency level might enhance response time, helping businesses manage crises more efficiently.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using Okta Platform for almost three and a half years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Okta Platform is absolutely stable, with no experienced lag. This ensures immediate action upon changes applied within Okta Platform, stabilizing operations in managing user accounts, identities, logins, and user profiles. With functionalities running smoothly, it fulfills stability expectations effectively.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Okta Platform's scalability is robust and performs well. It responds quickly and does not delay processes, yielding timely, appropriate results. There is no lag, allowing the platform to function smoothly. It is secure, providing needed scalability without impacting performance.
How are customer service and support?
While the deployment process was smooth, helped by Okta Platform's support team, more immediate assistance post-deployment is required. Currently, the support response time is too long, adversely affecting business during urgent issues or scenarios. A suggestion is improving the customer support experience by introducing a priority system for issues, allowing urgent cases to be addressed swiftly. Adding features in support ticketing to prioritize urgency could enhance effectiveness.
By offering a system to set varying priority levels on support tickets, urgent issues could receive quicker attention, benefiting business continuity and customer satisfaction.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We considered other identity platforms available in the market and ultimately chose Okta Platform for its unique, standalone identity management capabilities.
How was the initial setup?
Oakta Platform's deployment and initial setup were smooth and straightforward. We were guided effectively by Okta Platform's support team on how to configure it to fit our business needs and tenant setup.
What about the implementation team?
Our team implemented the platform internally without utilizing external consultants, integrators, or resellers, except for support guidance from Okta Platform's support team.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
We have a basic business standard license for Okta Platform. If we go beyond that, it is a little pricey compared to other models. Alternatives like Ping Identity, OneLogin, and Microsoft Azure AD offer minimal costs.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Comparisons were made with platforms like Microsoft Azure, which require interconnections, unlike Okta Platform's independent design. Our management team ultimately preferred Okta Platform for its unique identity management focus, taking insights from Okta Platform's demo presentations.
What other advice do I have?
Okta Platform's genuine uniqueness in focusing on identity is appreciable, unlike other tools requiring interconnected services. However, the pricing, initial configuration, and support response need improvements for enhanced customer satisfaction. A customer feedback mechanism to prioritize urgent issues might ensure timelier assistance during crises, maintaining business continuity and satisfaction. I would rate this overall experience as an eight out of ten.
Smooth, Secure Single Sign-On That Saves Time Every Day
What do you like best about the product?
What I like most about Okta, from a user perspective, is how easy it makes logging into everything I need day to day. With single sign-on, I only have to remember one set of credentials, and I can get into all my apps quickly without constantly re-entering passwords. That saves me a lot of time and cuts down on frustration.
Multi-factor authentication also adds an extra layer of security without feeling overly intrusive, and the push notifications are fast and simple to approve. Overall, it delivers a smooth, secure login experience that works quietly in the background and doesn’t slow me down.
What do you dislike about the product?
What I dislike about Okta is that, while it’s very reliable overall, it can sometimes feel a bit heavy in day-to-day use. At times, session timeouts seem to happen more often than I expect, which can interrupt my workflow—especially when I’m switching between apps.
From a user perspective, the MFA process is secure, but it can feel repetitive if I’m accessing multiple tools throughout the day or if I get logged out unexpectedly. There are also moments when the app dashboard feels a bit cluttered, particularly in organizations with a large number of integrated applications, which makes it slightly harder to quickly find what I need.
Overall, these aren’t major issues, but they do create small friction points in what is otherwise a smooth login experience.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Okta solves several key challenges related to managing access, security, and user authentication across multiple tools and platforms.
From a user perspective, it removes the need to remember and manage dozens of passwords by offering single sign-on (SSO), which makes day-to-day work much simpler. Rather than logging into different applications over and over, I can access everything through one secure portal, which saves time and reduces frustration.
It also helps reduce security risks by enforcing consistent authentication standards, including multi-factor authentication (MFA). This adds an important layer of protection for sensitive company data while keeping the login process relatively quick and straightforward.
Overall, Okta improves both efficiency and security. It makes it easier to stay productive while ensuring access to systems is properly controlled and protected.
Great Single Sign-On Experience with an Easy-to-Use Okta Portal
What do you like best about the product?
Great single sign on interface. Easy to use, find, and request software via okta portal
What do you dislike about the product?
High pricing, centralized single point of failure if Okta goes down or has an outage
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Ease of login to enterprise software suites
Easy Navigation and Single Sign-On Made Simple
What do you like best about the product?
Ease to navigate to all of our software in one place. Makes Single Sign on a breeze.
What do you dislike about the product?
Can be clunky integrating with other software. Sometimes creates errors in platforms that require time to troubleshoot.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Allowing us to work fluidly across multiple platforms and giving our team access easily.
Easy Integration Across Tools Under One Umbrella
What do you like best about the product?
How easy is it to integrate with many different tools while keeping everything under a single umbrella for users to manage
What do you dislike about the product?
It can sometimes be prescriptive for custom developments
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
It helps our collaborators manage all the tools at their disposal through a single integrated dashboard, and it helps us reliably and seamlessly track who is using what.
Efficient Integrations but Flawed Search
What do you like best about the product?
I like that Okta has a lot of pre-configured integrations and excellent guidance. The API is good and makes it easy to add new applications to Okta. I also appreciate how the API facilitates integration with the HR platform and supports automations. Additionally, I enjoy how Okta is integrated with a lot of software, like Google Workspace and Slack.
What do you dislike about the product?
The search feature is awful; it can't search by the middle of a pattern. For example, if you need to find a group named access_slack_users, you can't find it by searching 'slack'.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I use Okta for user authentication, application management, and provisioning. It solves single-sign-on issues, establishes a point of trust for users, and manages the employee lifecycle.
