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Defender by One Identity vs Fortinet FortiAuthenticator comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 20, 2026

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

Defender by One Identity
Ranking in Authentication Systems
12th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Fortinet FortiAuthenticator
Ranking in Authentication Systems
5th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
Single Sign-On (SSO) (10th), Identity Management (IM) (14th), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Authentication Systems category, the mindshare of Defender by One Identity is 1.6%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fortinet FortiAuthenticator is 3.0%, down from 7.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Authentication Systems Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Fortinet FortiAuthenticator3.0%
Defender by One Identity1.6%
Other95.4%
Authentication Systems
 

Featured Reviews

Mahesh Malve - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Business Development Associate at DigitalTrack Solutions ind pvt ltd
Advanced analytics have strengthened privileged access security and reduced incident response time
While One Identity Defender is a strong solution overall, there are a few areas where I feel it could be improved. One area is the user interface and dashboard customization. Although it is functional, making it more modern and allowing deeper customization would improve the user experience, especially for quick monitoring. Another improvement could be in reporting flexibility. While it provides good reports, having more custom report building options and easier export features would be helpful for different compliance and manageability needs. From an integration perspective, while One Identity Defender works well with core systems, having more out-of-the-box integrations with modern cloud services and SaaS platforms would reduce the need for custom configuration. In terms of support, the overall support is good, but faster response times for critical issues and more detailed troubleshooting documentation would help teams resolve problems more efficiently.
reviewer2848395 - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Business Development Manager at a outsourcing company with 501-1,000 employees
Multi-factor security has improved device protection but still needs broader application coverage
Fortinet FortiAuthenticator could be improved in its cost structure. Although it is not expensive, other solutions offer more value for less money. Cisco Duo provides better value in this regard and connects to web applications much more easily, scaling effectively in that sense. While I have never used Cisco Duo to secure other devices in IoT environments, I know Cisco Duo is capable of doing so, whereas Fortinet FortiAuthenticator cannot. Additionally, Cisco Duo is also cheaper. These are the main reasons why we switched away from Fortinet FortiAuthenticator, as it was very limited compared to other solutions available. Fortinet FortiAuthenticator was primarily missing the ability to scale to web applications.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's very fast, and it's easy to use because it's integrated with Active Directory."
"We find that the product scales very well."
"One Identity Defender has good network protection."
"One Identity Defender has positively impacted our organization by improving overall security through the addition of MFA, which reduces the risk of unauthorized access and makes user authentication more controlled and reliable."
"We have definitely seen a positive ROI from using One Identity Defender, as our security team now spends about twenty to thirty percent less time on manual log analytics and investigations because the system automatically highlights high-risk activities, and we did not need to increase team size despite growing infrastructure as the tool helps us handle more security events with the same team."
"If you decide to activate this solution, your infrastructure will be centered around flexibility."
"The first valuable feature is being able to see everything on one platform. This includes logs and authentication failure."
"FortiAuthenticator is really good software that integrates very well with Fortinet products."
"It integrates very tightly with the rest of the Fortinet ecosystem."
"We have not had issues with Fortinet FortiAuthenticator. It is stable."
"The feature I value the most is the one-time passwords because it helps to authenticate users so you know the timing of their usage."
"The implementation has significantly improved access management within our organization."
"The product's initial setup phase was easy. It is also easy to deploy."
"This is a perfect solution for authentication services."
 

Cons

"One Identity Defender is a strong product, but there are a few areas where it can be improved."
"We have some clients that are wanting to protect their Apache web servers with One Identity Defender but all the research I have done says cannot be done. It can only be oriented to an IIS server. One Identity Defender should have more integration with more types of web servers."
"Maybe it could provide support for more web applications. It seems more focused on IIS web applications."
"The login capabilities could be better."
"The only reason it is not a ten is because response time can sometimes be slower for complex or escalated cases."
"The solution's command line interface could be improved to provide better support for low-level debugging and advanced configurations."
"It does the job I paid for, but the graphical interface could be improved."
"The GUI is not fancy enough and some of the settings are difficult to access."
"I would like to see some email options for Fortinet FortiAuthenticator."
"The integration with other products, for example, some SAML authentications, would make it more flexible."
"The only way the solution could be improved is if it were cheaper."
"It can not use SQL to query FortiAnalyzer directly."
"The hardware aspect of the solution could be improved. We are not really able to understand the hardware capabilities of the device."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"I rate the product price as two or three on a one-to-ten scale, where one is expensive, and ten is cheap."
"It's not expensive."
"I would rate the pricing a four out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. It is not that costly. It is cheap, easy to manage, easy to install, and easy to configure."
"I price of the solution is expensive."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is a high price and ten is a low price, I rate the pricing a seven."
"I rate the price of Fortinet FortiAuthenticator a three out of five."
"The pricing is fair."
"The platform provides a user-based pricing model rather than a subscription pricing model."
report
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
23%
Construction Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Retailer
6%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise1
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business38
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise11
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with One Identity Defender?
One Identity Defender is a strong product, but there are a few areas where it can be improved. First, the user interface and reporting dashboards could be made more intuitive and customizable for f...
What is your primary use case for One Identity Defender?
One Identity Defender strengthens identity and access security through MFA, helping us ensure that only authorized users can access critical systems, especially for privileged accounts, with a focu...
What advice do you have for others considering One Identity Defender?
My advice for others looking into using One Identity Defender would be first to clearly define your use case, especially whether you need MFA mainly for privileged access, remote users, or both, as...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortinet FortiAuthenticator?
My experience with Fortinet FortiAuthenticator's pricing found the pricing to be good. There are better solutions available in the market. Overall, Fortinet FortiAuthenticator is an inexpensive sol...
What needs improvement with Fortinet FortiAuthenticator?
Fortinet FortiAuthenticator could be improved in its cost structure. Although it is not expensive, other solutions offer more value for less money. Cisco Duo provides better value in this regard an...
What is your primary use case for Fortinet FortiAuthenticator?
Fortinet FortiAuthenticator was implemented as a multi-factor authentication solution to serve as a second barrier for accessing and unlocking devices. However, Fortinet FortiAuthenticator was limi...
 

Also Known As

No data available
FortiAuthenticator
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bakersfield Police Department, Village of Westmont, Illinois
Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Find out what your peers are saying about Defender by One Identity vs. Fortinet FortiAuthenticator and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
917,433 professionals have used our research since 2012.