Top 10 Best Keycloak Alternatives – Open Source SSO (Pros and Cons)
What is Keycloak?
Top 10 Best Keycloak Alternatives – Open Source SSO (Pros and Cons). Keycloak is an open source Identity and Access Management tool developed for modern applications and services. Keycloak comprises features such as Single Sign On (SSO), User Federation, Admin Console, Account Management Console, Social Login, Identity Brokering, Client Adapters, two factor authentication (2FA), LDAP integration and so much more. It helps to secure authentication to applications and services without any hassles. There is no need to store or authenticate users, as everything is ready to use straightaway.
However, users who want to try new or different security and user management features may be looking for best Keycloak Alternatives. Here are the reviews of top 10 best Keycloak alternatives featuring Open source SSO.
1. Okta Single Sign On
Okta is one of the industry leading identity and access management tools for your customers and employees. It offers a highly secure Cloud Single Sign On (SSO) solution with over 7000+ pre built integrations, so you can easily deploy SSO to your Cloud Apps in no time, without having to build or manage integrations.
Okta has a single central control panel where you can have an overview to secure and manage all the users access. Also the SSO solution can connect to and sync data from various identity stores such as HR, LDAP, AD systems and so on. For robust security, Okta comprises built in tools such as Okta Insights to automatically detect and block malicious login attempts within the network. Besides, it can also employ access auditing with pre built reporting to help you stay compliant.
Lastly, Okta features an intuitive browser based dashboard that you can flexibly customize and access from your remote devices.
Pros of Okta
- Easy to use.
- Single sign on across multiple cloud providers.
- Does not require expertise of the system.
- Over 7000+ integrations.
- Multi factor authentication.
- Provides API for easy integration into application authentication.
- Reporting and troubleshooting features for access auditing.
Cons of Okta
- UI a bit inconsistent.
- Reports are not easy to read.
- SCIM configuration is a quite bit confusing compared to the SAML configuration with Okta.
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2. Auth0 SSO
Auth0 is second in this list, due to its easy to implement design and intuitive set of features. It is a secure SSO solution to make things easier for employees, customers and partners without losing control over the security.
Auth0 is easy to use, provides enhanced user control and robust security to the users. The SSO solution from social login, username & password authentication or enterprise federation, allows you to quickly log in once and access all permitted applications, regardless of their platform, technology or domain used.
It can adopt configuration of any enterprise connection such as ADFS, LDAP, SAML, Active Directory, etc. with just a few coding lines. You can leverage custom domains during login flow to boost your brand presence. It offers mobile, lock and a web login widget for an embedded SSO experience within your application.
Some main highlights of Auth0 include centralized control for provisioning and provisioning of user accounts, advanced analytics, role based permissions, logs for debugging and auditing and compliance with GDPR, SOC2, HIPAA and many others. Moreover, it leverages standard based protocols including LDAP, OAuth2 and OpenID Connect.
Pros of Auth0
- Excellent documentation.
- Customizable DevOps focused toolset.
- Easy to use with integrations.
- Use of Javascript everywhere.
- Role based permissions with granular settings
- Solid customer support
- API first approach
- Scalable.
- Password less.
Cons of Auth0
- Role management is a bit complex
- Less support for DDR (Disaster Data Recovery)
- No dashboards
- Custom domain integrations and paid plans are expensive.
- Weak integrations.
3. Microsoft Azure AD SSO
Another on the list of Top 10 Best Keycloak Alternatives is Microsoft Azure AD . It is an enterprise identity services that offers secure SSO and multi factor authentication to protect users from cybersecurity attacks. It offers exceptional developer tools so you can easily integrate identity into your apps and services.
Azure AD offers self service management to save your time and resources. Besides, it can automate workflows for quick user provisioning.
It supports thousands of pre built SaaS applications. Azure AD offers robust security with its various standards based certifications, in house security experts and years of experience.
Pros of Azure AD SSO
- High availability
- Password less technology.
- Conditional Access
- Built in replication and redundancy across Domain Controllers
- Cost effective
- SSO authentication for multiple applications
- Security and the facility to manage all the services and users.
- Integrates with wide range of SaaS apps
- Audit logs
Cons of Azure AD SSO
- UI is a bit complex.
- Integration with 3rd party services.
- Inability to nest groups.
- Configuration Documentation.
- Not possible to deactivate a user temporarily, you can only delete the user.
4. Cognito
Amazon Cognito is a secure and simple sign in, sign up and access control tool for your web and mobile apps. It can be scaled to millions of users and also supports sign in with social identity providers such as Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon and other enterprise identity providers through OpenID Connect and SAML 2.0.
Amazon Cognito User Pools acts like a highly secure identity store that can house millions of users. It can be easily configured without any infrastructure provisioning; besides every member of the user pool will get a directory profile that you can manage via SDK (Software Development Kit).
It supports multi factor authentication and encryption of data in transit and data at rest. Robust security is further backed with compliance to HIPAA, ISO/IEC, SOC and PCI DSS standards. Lastly, it also employs access control for AWS resources.
Pros of Cognito
- Customizable UI.
- It helps login/sign up to all social and business platforms.
- Easy to store user profile data directly in Cognito without additional services/endpoints.
- Easy configuration
- Pay for only what you use
- Secure user directory
- Has good synergy with AWS ecosystem
Cons of Cognito
- API needs to be more detailed.
- Not a complete solution – Amazon Cognito needs features for enterprise applications, like user management, role based access control.
- It’s reliant on AWS.
5. Ping Identity
Ping Identity Single Sign on (SSO) solution allows users to log into all their services and SaaS, mobile, cloud and enterprise applications in just one click, regardless of their location or device being used.
For robust security, it leverages identity standards like OpenID Connect, OAuth and SAML and securely transmits encrypted tokens between server and apps. Ping Identity offers loads of integrations to support third party web servers and applications such as Office 365, SharePoint, Apache, Java, MobileIron and so on.
Main benefit of Ping Identity is that it offers Self Service application integration to boost productivity of your Identity and access management (IAM) teams and save their resources. A central admin console is where admins can easily monitor all IAM services.
Pros of Ping Identity
- Easy to use
- Robust security for business applications.
- Integrates with VPN software making it easier to integrate with your current environment.
- Strong cloud capabilities with on prem components.
- Self service for your IAM (Identity and Access Management)
- Good customer support
Cons of Ping Identity
- Does Not support all workflows.
- Some products are only cloud based (PingOne, PingID).
- Confusing documentation
6. ForgeRock
ForgeRock is another on the list of Top 10 Best Keycloak Alternatives that offers exceptional SSO Authentication experiences without compromising on security. It offers secure SSO solutions for your workforce, applications, services and customers. You can enable SSO per domain, throughout domains and even externally with federated SSO. Where the application runs via third party , on premise or on cloud, you can easily access it via a single, secure login.
Based on zero trust principles, ForgeRock implements intelligence to login decisions and transforms user locations and devices into analytics to take real time, policy based decisions for user access. It also employs SSO solutions to your legacy applications.
It features Intelligence Access with a low code approach, so you need to simply drag and drop different components like contextual authentication or authentication methods into your SSO solution.
Biggest advantage of ForgeRock is the Passwordless authentication methods based on user context.
Pros of ForgeRock
- Password less authentication methods.
- Impressive Intelligent Access.
- Robust security features
- Easy configuration
- Scalable.
- Good integration with Java based applications.
Cons of ForgeRock
- Expensive support
- Debug logging is all over the place in different files.
7. WSO2 Identity Server
WSO2 Identity Server is an open source, API driven and cloud native IAM tool that aims to deliver seamless single login experiences. It allows you to modernize and consolidate your CIAM and IAM abilities whilst reducing costs and accelerating time to market.
WSO2 Identity Server requires minimal code changes and delivers greater user experiences with improved efficiency. It supports various standards including SAML, OIDC and WS Federation. Moreover, it features cross protocol SLO and SSO along with 24/7 dedicated support.
Pros of WSO2 Identity Server
- Scalable server.
- Easy to implement
- Pre built connectors.
- Can be deployed anywhere, cloud or on prem.
- Custom extensions.
- Integrates with WSO2 API Manager.
- Uses RBAC (Role Based Access Control).
- Streamlines access.
Cons of WSO2 Identity Server
- Does not support many modules and workflows and have to integrate externally.
- Lack of documentation.
8. AWS Single Sign On
Next on the list of Top 10 Best Keycloak Alternatives is AWS SSO. It is a cloud based tool that centrally looks after your multiple AWS applications or user accounts. You can easily create your workforce identifies and securely manage access via a central console throughout your AWS organization. Users can access their AWS accounts, Cloud Apps, Amazon EC2 Windows instances or even other SAML based apps through a unique user portal.
Not just identities in AWS SSO, but you can also sync them from your Microsoft AD or other identity providers such as Azure AD or Okta Universal Directory. Centrally, admin can define, assign and customize fine grained access. You can also leverage user attributes for attribute based control (ABAC).
Pros of AWS SSO
- Easy to configure.
- Two factor authentication.
- Great for large and small enterprises.
- Manages multiple AWS accounts and business apps.
Cons of AWS SSO
- Documentation could be improved
9. OneLogin
OneLogin is a comprehensive SSO solution to access Web Apps in the Cloud, as well as behind the firewall via tablets, smartphones and desktops. It offers seamless IAM experiences to your partners, customers and workforce. With policy driven password security, context aware access management and MFA (multi factor authentication), OneLogin protects your sensitive data. To heighten protection, you can further leverage password, reset self service policy, session timeouts, demanding password policies such as required complexity or length and also restrict password reuse.
For multiple staging and production environments, you can simply use OneLogin SSO to create multiple logins to the same type of application. Not just that, it also features Social Login which lets you login to OneLogin through Social Identity Provider credentials from LinkedIn, Google+, Facebook and Twitter. Not just enterprise apps, but users can also add their own personal apps via their SSO portal.
Pros of OneLogin
- Granular level admin rights with zero trust principle
- Pre integrated with thousands of apps
- Application dashboard
- API first approach
- Simple, easy to use design.
- Encryption.
- Stores the user credentials.
Cons of OneLogin
- UI not customizable
- Expensive .
- Interface updates.
- Custom CSSand login pages
- Poor customer service and response time.
10. FusionAuth
FusionAuth is last on the Top 10 Best Keycloak Alternatives. It seamlessly adopts user management, authorization, authentication, reporting and analytics extremely fast. The SSO solution has loads of APIs and theme based login pages to provide seamless experiences across all applications. You can even use the already implemented auth workflows to save time.
FusionAuth supports SAMLv2 and OIDC standards, so you can easily leverage it for your SaaS and other off the shelf software. It offers greater admin control over SSO behavior of users. It easily integrates with any application, framework and language. The main highlights of FusionAuth include social login, password less authentication, MFA, SSO, OAuth, JWT, registration, login and so much more. It complies with HIPAA, GDPR, COPPA and PCI standards to offer exceptional security.
Pros of FusionAuth
- Multi factor authentication
- Easy to implement
- UI is good
- Adequate documentation
- Robust customer support
- Admin portal is intuitive
Cons of FusionAuth
- Beginners may find configuration a bit complex.
- Lack of multi tenant features.
- UI is not intuitive in some cases, like roles and permissions.
Top 10 Best Keycloak Alternatives – Open Source SSO (Pros and Cons) Conclusion
To summarize Keycloak is one of the leading open source IAM (Identity and Access Management) tools. However, if you want to look for newer or better IAM and SSO (Single Sign on) features, you can try out Keycloak Alternatives reviewed above.
All of the tools listed here are secure, compliant and offer exceptional set of SSO features for improved user authentication and authorization to applications and services with no fuss.
