The CIAM-first Microsoft Entra ID alternative
Microsoft Entra ID (formerly Azure Active Directory) tacked on customer identity as an afterthought. Frontegg is made for CIAM use cases — and always has been. You’ll see and feel the difference from the start.
Microsoft Entra ID may claim to support external identity management, but its capabilities feel like an afterthought, lacking the depth needed for customer identity and access management (CIAM) use cases. Frontegg, by contrast, is purpose-built for CIAM, delivering seamless customer identity experiences that scale with your business.
While Frontegg focuses on enhancing customer authentication, onboarding, and engagement, Entra External ID’s workforce-oriented architecture results in limited usability, flexibility, and scalability for CIAM. Critical features like multi-tenancy and self-service often require extra effort to implement, and reliance on the broader Microsoft ecosystem adds unnecessary complexity for developers.
Entra External ID supports basic CIAM functions like social logins and user registration. But deriving full value from the platform often requires complex workarounds.
On the other hand, Frontegg allows businesses to deliver advanced user experiences right away through capabilities like organization hierarchies, user groups, and support for multi-apps.
Integration with Entra External ID is so messy, even many companies that already use Entra for workforce identity use cases avoid it. With Entra, developers are forced to navigate multiple configurations for tenants, manage cross-tenant access settings, and ensure compatibility with related technologies like conditional access and entitlement management. Are you exhausted yet?
With Frontegg, configurations for tenants and cross-tenant settings are easy to handle. You’ll get a streamlined integration experience with SDKs and APIs that let developers plug CIAM features directly into their applications. Teams can actually focus on innovation rather than wrestling with underlying identity infrastructure.
Microsoft Entra External ID relies on a workforce-focused security framework, providing basic MFA and Conditional Access but lacking the depth and flexibility needed for customer-facing applications.
Frontegg ensures full protection without sacrificing user experience. Our Security Suite is purpose-built for CIAM, offering advanced security features like adaptive MFA tailored to customer contexts, session management with real-time monitoring, and developer integration for token policies and permissions.
Scaling with Microsoft Entra External ID can be a pain, especially when managing multiple tenants for different customer applications. Frontegg makes it easy to support many organizations’ identity needs within a unified platform. We handle millions of users without a hitch.
Frontegg offers more tailored authentication solutions with deep customization and API flexibility, which Entra ID doesn’t fully support with its more standardized setup.
Standard login
No-code customization
API customization
Hosted IDP
M2M authentication
With advanced RBAC and feature management, Frontegg provides precise control over access and permissions, unlike Entra ID’s more basic entitlement options.
RBAC
ABAC
Subscription-based
Feature flags
Trial management
Frontegg allows companies to specify different organizational hierarchies — like divisions, departments, or teams — to ensure everyone has the appropriate access.
Organization management
Hierarchies
Role level organization
Login per organization
User groups
Frontegg strengthens security with adaptive MFA, delivering more end-user-centric protection that Entra ID lacks.
Risk and fraud engines
Security dashboards
Organizational level policies
Adaptive MFA
Step up
Logs streaming
Frontegg meets enterprise standards with not just SSO but also SCIM.
SSO
SCIM
Audit logs
Frontegg offers better visibility and control with its detailed user management and analytics tools.
User management
Usage dashboard
Organizational signals
Admin portal
Frontegg delivers extensive self-service capabilities for user and org management, unlike Entra ID.
User login and signup
Profile management
User invitation
SSO & SCIM configuration
Security configuration
