Okta vs Auth0
Start with the fact that reframes the whole comparison: Okta acquired Auth0 in 2021 and sells it as Okta Customer Identity Cloud. The brand, the dashboard and the developer docs all survived, which is why this rarely reads as one vendor, but it is. So this page is not "which supplier", it is two genuinely different products from the same supplier, and the useful question is which of your two identity problems you are solving: your employees logging into SaaS, or your users logging into your application.
Auth0 is the right product if you are building signup and login into an application you ship, and you want SDKs, hosted login pages and social or enterprise connections without operating anything. Okta Workforce Identity is the right product for staff single sign-on, directory and joiner and leaver automation. Neither answers vendor concentration, because they are one company. If that is your reason for moving, the shortlist you want is the self-hosted or independent one.
Side by side
Okta Workforce Identity vs Auth0 at a glance
| Okta Workforce Identity | Auth0 | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Okta | Okta, since 2021 |
| Whose logins | Your employees | Users of your application |
| What you're billed for | Users per month | Monthly active users, in bands |
| Free tier | ✗ none | ✓ 25,000 MAU, 1 enterprise connection |
| Contract minimum | $1,500 a year | ✓ none on self-serve tiers |
| Entry paid price | Starter $6 per user per month | B2C Essentials from $35 a month at 500 MAU |
| Business-customer tier | Not the product for it | B2B Essentials from $150, 3 SSO connections |
| Extra SSO connection | Not metered this way | $100 a month each above the included three |
| Annual billing | Required | Optional, charged as 11x monthly |
| Over your tier | Add users, add cost | Billed at the next band up |
| Published price ceiling | Essentials $17, then quote-only | Bands to $2,100 at 30,000 MAU, then quote |
| Primary interface | Admin console, app catalogue | APIs, SDKs, hosted login, Actions |
| Directory federation | ✓ Universal Directory, AD and LDAP | Enterprise connections per customer |
| Self-hosting | ✗ | ✗ |
| Solves vendor concentration | ✗ | ✗ same company |
| Best for | Staff SSO, directory, lifecycle | Login inside a product you ship |
Sources: Okta pricing · Auth0 pricing. Compiled August 2026.
Where Auth0 wins
It is built for developers, and it shows
Auth0 assumes the integration is code. SDKs for the frameworks people actually use, a hosted login page you can restyle, Actions for custom logic at points in the authentication flow, and documentation written for someone wiring up a callback rather than someone administering a tenant. Adding social login, passwordless or an enterprise connection to an application is an afternoon. Okta Workforce Identity can technically serve customer logins, but you spend the whole time working against a tool designed around employees, groups and lifecycle.
There is a real free tier, and it is generous
$0 up to 25,000 monthly active users with one enterprise connection. Nothing in Workforce Identity is free, and its $1,500 annual contract minimum means the smallest sensible Okta purchase is more than most side projects will ever spend. For a product before revenue this difference is the entire decision.
Monthly active users match how a product grows
Billing on people who actually logged in fits an application with a long tail of dormant accounts. Register a million users, have 20,000 come back this month, and you pay for 20,000. A per-user model does not distinguish, which is exactly why using staff-shaped pricing for consumer logins gets expensive fast.
B2B SSO is a product, not a project
If your customers are companies that demand SAML, B2B Essentials from $150 a month includes three SSO connections and each additional one is $100. That is a clean answer to the enterprise checklist, with organisations, per-tenant connections and invitation flows already modelled, rather than something you build on top of a workforce directory.
Where this comparison stops being a comparison
It is one vendor. If you are here because a single supplier holds every door in your company, or because of how a past incident was handled, moving from Okta to Auth0 does not change the supplier, the roadmap or the concentration of risk. It changes the product and the invoice. That can be a perfectly good reason to move, and it is not the reason people usually think they are moving.
The band mechanic surprises people. Auth0 prices in monthly active user bands, and going over a band bills you at the next band up rather than for the overage. A launch, a marketing spike or a bot wave that briefly triples logins lands you in a higher band for that period, so model your worst month rather than your average one. Annual billing is charged as eleven times the monthly price, which is a discount worth taking only once your traffic is predictable enough that you are not paying a year up front for a band you will grow out of.
Add-ons carry the enterprise feature set. The headline tier is not the whole bill: an enterprise MFA add-on is $100 a month on Essentials, and extra SSO connections are $100 each. A B2B configuration assembled from the pieces you need lands meaningfully above the $150 entry line, which is fine when you know it in advance and irritating when you do not.
And neither product is self-hostable. Auth0 is SaaS. If the requirement is data residency, air-gapped operation or an identity provider you can run yourself, this is the wrong pair to be choosing between: that is the Keycloak, authentik and Zitadel side of the list.
Choosing between them, practically
Three questions settle it:
1. Whose accounts are these? Staff who need SSO to Salesforce and Slack and to be de-provisioned on their last day is Workforce Identity. People who signed up in your product is Auth0. If the answer is both, that is two products and, on Okta's own price list, two purchases.
2. Which unit is cheaper for your shape? Count employees for one and model monthly active users, including your worst month, for the other. Then count enterprise connections, because at $100 each above the included three that line grows with your customer list rather than your user count.
3. Is vendor concentration the actual reason? If yes, stop comparing these two. The honest options are self-hosted, meaning Keycloak or authentik, or an independent cloud provider such as Zitadel, Logto or WorkOS.
Common questions
FAQ: Okta vs Auth0
Is Auth0 owned by Okta?
Yes. Okta acquired Auth0 in 2021 and sells it today as Okta Customer Identity Cloud. The Auth0 brand, dashboard, tenants and developer documentation all continue to exist, which is why it rarely registers as the same vendor, but the company, the roadmap and the commercial relationship are Okta's. If your reason for leaving Okta is concentration of risk in one supplier, Auth0 does not address it.
What is the difference between Okta and Auth0?
Whose logins they are for, and therefore what you get billed on. Okta Workforce Identity handles employees: single sign-on to SaaS, Universal Directory, lifecycle management, and it bills per user per month with a $1,500 annual contract minimum. Auth0 handles the users of your own application: it is an API and SDK-first platform for signup, login and token issuance, and it bills per monthly active user in bands, free to 25,000. Using Workforce Identity for a consumer app or Auth0 for your staff both technically work and both fight the pricing model.
How much does Auth0 cost in 2026?
The free tier is $0 up to 25,000 monthly active users with one enterprise connection. For consumer apps, B2C Essentials starts at $35 a month at 500 monthly active users and rises through bands to $2,100 at 30,000; B2C Professional starts at $240. For business customers, B2B Essentials starts at $150 a month at 500 monthly active users and includes three SSO connections, with each additional connection at $100 a month, and B2B Professional starts at $800. An enterprise MFA add-on is $100 a month on Essentials. Two details decide real invoices: annual billing is charged as eleven times the monthly price, and exceeding a band bills you at the next band up rather than pro rata.