Keycloak vs. WorkOS, an Open-Source Alternative
Exploring Keycloak as an Alternative to WorkOS for Authentication Solutions
Keycloak and WorkOS are both identity and access management (IAM) solutions that offer various features for authentication, authorization, and user management. While they serve similar purposes, there are key differences between the two platforms that make them unique and suitable for different use cases. Keycloak is an open source platform under active development for over 8 years and known for its scalability and customization options. WorkOS is a closed-source platform that can quickly integrate SSO to an application. In this blog post, we'll explore the key differences between Keycloak and WorkOS, focusing on factors such as cost of ownership, scalability, deployments, and maintenance.
Cost of Ownership
Keycloak: Keycloak is an open-source solution and is available for free, making it a cost-effective choice for startups, small businesses, and enterprises alike. It allows organizations to save on licensing fees and scale without worrying about escalating SSO, authentication, and other costs. It does, however, require infrastructure to host and run the application, which can run up costs if a business does not have the proper internal resources or external support. This provides a more predictable cost model when bringing together multiple applications, knowing that as additional connections are created, costs will not increase. The biggest factor in cost becomes the scale of needed infrastructure.
WorkOS: WorkOS operates on a subscription-based model, where pricing is tied to the number of monthly active users. While the first million users are included (at time of publishing), WorkOs charges for Custom domains, SSO connections, SCIM, and Audit logs. The more enterprise customers you have, the more your costs will grow. This approach allows customers to scale their identity management solution as needed, while also gaining access to additional features and support based on their chosen plan. Organizations must keep in mind that with every feature enabled, the per user cost grows significantly and bills can rapidly sky-rocket, becoming a large financial piece of the overall IT spend.
Winner
With the proper hosting solution, Keycloak is a far more cost-effective choice. Since cost isn't driven by features or users, the ongoing cost is fixed, enabling organizations to allocate funds to other resources. Leverage Phase Two's Free Hosting Tier to test and integrate Authorization and Authentication into an application(s).
Deployment and Maintenance
Keycloak: Keycloak is a solution that can be deployed on-premises or in a private cloud. It provides complete control over the infrastructure and allows customization and integration with existing systems. With support for Docker, Kubernetes, and other containerization technologies, Keycloak simplifies deployment across various environments, ensuring seamless integration into existing infrastructure and workflows.
Due to Keycloak’s self-hosted nature, however, organizations must allocate resources for installing, configuring, and updating the software, as well as managing the underlying infrastructure.
WorkOS: WorkOS is a cloud-based identity platform that is hosted and managed by WorkOS. It offers a simpler deployment process as there is no need to set up or maintain any infrastructure. Organizations benefit from reduced internal IT burden, as WorkOS handles updates, security patches, and system maintenance.
Winner
WorkOS provides a more hassle-free identity management experience by offloading infrastructure responsibilities through a fully managed service.
Customization and Branding
Keycloak: Keycloak offers unparalleled customization and extensibility -- from authentication flows and user federation to role-based access control (RBAC) and fine-grained permission -- enabling organizations to tailor the user experience, login screens, and authentication process to their specific needs. This level of customization requires working in and gaining knowledge of the capabilities of Keycloak.
WorkOS: WorkOS on the other hand, offers limited customization options and focuses more on providing a unified user experience across different identity providers. We certainly tip our hats to WorkOS for the fantastic job they’ve done at creating a wonderful user experience from a design and user experience perspective.
Winner
Keycloak by a nose. Keycloak offers complete control over the look and feel of the authentication and authorization process. However, WorkOS has done a strong job at simplifying and constraining the world for quick implementation.
Scalability and Performance
Keycloak: With its robust architecture, Keycloak is designed to handle large-scale user bases, making it an ideal choice for enterprises. It can be easily scaled horizontally by adding more instances or running in a clustered mode, ensuring high performance and reliability. Keycloak offers a great platform to unify on for companies that find themselves with a burgeoning number of applications that have each gone their own way of IAM implementation.
WorkOS: While WorkOS offers scalable infrastructure, it's better suited for smaller to medium-sized applications with moderate to high traffic volumes. Its architecture is optimized for efficient performance, but may not be as well-equipped to handle extremely high volumes of user traffic or a ballooning of connected enterprises. It’s better at working with a specific application rather than connecting multiple applications.
Winner
Depends. Keycloak is a strong contender for large-scale applications looking to scale, but WorkOS may deliver stronger performance for small-mediums sized apps.
Functionality and Flexibility
Keycloak: Keycloak offers a comprehensive suite of features to meet the needs of modern apps. It provides secure authentication methods, including username/password, social logins, and MFA, as well as fine-grained authorization controls through RBAC and ABAC. Keycloak excels in identity federation with support for SAML and OpenID Connect, and its SSO feature offers a seamless user experience across apps. It also offers robust user management capabilities, customization options, self-registration, and active community support. For any functionality that might be missing, extensions to Keycloak can be written and deployed. This allows for Keycloak to bend and mold to the needs of its developers.
WorkOS: WorkOS offers robust authentication and authorization capabilities, including role-based access control, policy management, and support for multiple identity standards. Its single sign-on feature provides a seamless user experience across apps and services. WorkOS also features self-service registration, account recovery, and a comprehensive user directory. Integration with third-party apps is simplified through APIs and pre-built integrations, while analytics and logging tools help with monitoring and compliance.
Winner
Both WorkOS and Keycloak offer robust functionality, but Keycloak's advanced identity federation capabilities, fine-grained authorization controls, and ability to customize and extend give it an edge over WorkOS.
Integration Capabilities
Keycloak: The identity brokering capability of Keycloak enables delegation authentication to external Identity Providers (IdPs), applications, and protocols such as LDAP, SAML, OAuth, OpenID Connect. Managing internal permissions and roles, security checks, login experiences across different systems can be done seamlessly.
If you’re switching from WorkOS, for example, Keycloak can be configured to act as a broker that sits between WorkOS and your applications to leverage the strengths of both platforms. For example, WorkOS can be used for external user management, while Keycloak can handle more sensitive, internal authentication needs.
WorkOS: There is a narrower focus on authentication, but WorkOS provides a uniform API to integrate with popular identity providers like Google, Microsoft, and Okta. The unified interface reduces the complexity and development time.
Winner
Keycloak is the most versatile choice for organizations with complex requirements.
Community and Support
Keycloak has a large and active community of developers and contributors, ensuring continuous development, bug fixes, and updates. It has extensive documentation, forums, and community support channels where users can seek help and share knowledge. WorkOS also provides support but may have limitations in terms of community contributions and public resources. It offers dedicated support channels and resources to its users for assistance and issue resolution.
Which One Is Best for Me?
In determining the most suitable identity and access management solution for your organization, it is essential to consider the specific requirements and priorities of your enterprise. In summary, Keycloak is an open-source identity and access management solution that offers extensive customization and integration capabilities, making it suitable for organizations with complex requirements. WorkOS, on the other hand, is a cloud-based identity platform that simplifies integration and deployment but may have limitations in terms of scalability and customization options.
Working with Phase Two provides some of the best of both worlds: easy integration with ability to scale without incurring additional costs.
If you’re looking to migrate to Keycloak, or have questions about Phase Two’s enterprise support, please contact us.