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Dagger vs One Identity

Dagger logo

Dagger

Developer Tools

Programmable CI/CD engine that runs your pipeline as containers on any runner

From
Free
Free plan
Yes
Full reviewWebsite
One Identity logo

One Identity

Cybersecurity

Quest-owned identity governance, PAM and Active Directory management

From
On request
Free plan
No
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Dagger has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Dagger dagger is not a CI provider, so you keep paying for GitHub Actions or GitLab runners underneath it; the Dagger Cloud subscription is an addition to your CI bill, not a replacement for it.; One Identity the portfolio is assembled from separate acquisitions, so components are separately licensed, separately administered and do not present one console, which raises operational cost.
  • They diverge on capability: Dagger covers Pipelines as code, One Identity covers Identity Manager.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Dagger and One Identity actually diverge.

Attributes where Dagger and One Identity differ
AttributeDaggerOne Identity
Starting priceFreeOn request
Pricing modelPer month per team for Dagger Cloudquote
Free tierYesNo
PlatformsLinux, macOS, Windows, Self-hostedWeb, Windows, Linux
CategoryDeveloper ToolsCybersecurity

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Dagger

  • Pipelines as code
  • Local and CI parity
  • Content-addressed caching
  • Dagger Functions and modules
  • CI-provider agnostic
  • Dagger Cloud traces
  • GitHub Checks integration
  • Container-native execution

Only in One Identity

  • Identity Manager
  • Safeguard
  • Active Roles
  • OneLogin
  • Password Manager
  • syslog-ng
  • Starling connectors

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Dagger

  • A platform team maintaining near-identical build YAML across forty repositories that wants one versioned module every repository calls insteadnot One Identity
  • An engineering organisation migrating off a CI provider that does not want to rewrite every pipeline as part of the migrationnot One Identity
  • A team whose engineers waste hours pushing commits to debug CI-only failures and needs to reproduce the exact run locallynot One Identity
  • A monorepo where most commits touch a small subset of services and cache-accurate step skipping cuts build minutes materiallynot One Identity

One Identity

  • An organisation whose authoritative directory will remain on premises Active Directory and needs delegated administration with attribute-level controlnot Dagger
  • A government or defence environment requiring privileged session management on a hardened physical appliance rather than a cloud servicenot Dagger
  • A manufacturer with SAP and Active Directory needing provisioning governed under one certification processnot Dagger
  • An enterprise consolidating Active Directory after an acquisition and needing automated account lifecycle across both forestsnot Dagger

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Dagger

  • Dagger is not a CI provider, so you keep paying for GitHub Actions or GitLab runners underneath it; the Dagger Cloud subscription is an addition to your CI bill, not a replacement for it.
  • Writing pipelines in Go or TypeScript raises the barrier to entry: a release engineer who could edit a YAML step now needs to read code, and the people who can fix a broken build shrink to those comfortable with the SDK.
  • The engine runs as a container on the runner and needs a persistent cache volume to deliver its main benefit, so ephemeral CI runners give you correctness without the speed, and provisioning durable cache storage is extra platform work.
  • The Team plan caps at ten users and ten million events per month; an organisation of any size crosses that quickly and moves to Enterprise pricing that is not published, so cost at scale is unknowable up front.
  • The module ecosystem is young and thinly maintained relative to the marketplace of a mature CI provider, so integrations that exist as a one-line Action often have to be written yourself as a Dagger function.

One Identity

  • The portfolio is assembled from separate acquisitions, so components are separately licensed, separately administered and do not present one console, which raises operational cost.
  • Identity Manager implementations are customisation-heavy and commonly run over a year, with the services spend exceeding the licence cost in the first year.
  • Quest has changed private equity ownership more than once since the Dell separation, and buyers should ask directly about product investment commitments before signing a multi-year deal.
  • Product documentation and support sit behind a customer portal, which makes independent evaluation before purchase harder than with vendors that publish openly.
  • The cloud-native and developer experience trails the pure-play identity vendors, so organisations moving decisively to SaaS applications find the on premises heritage becomes a constraint rather than an asset.

Pricing, plan by plan

Dagger

Free
  • IndividualFree
    • One user
    • One million events per month
    • Workflow logs and function call traces
  • Team$50/month
    • Up to ten users
    • Ten million events per month
    • Module insights and module catalogue
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • Custom user and event limits
    • SSO
    • Managed single-tenant deployment

One Identity

On request
  • Identity Manager$undefined/year
    • Priced per managed identity
    • On premises or hosted
    • Access certification and provisioning
  • Safeguard$undefined/year
    • Priced per privileged user or per appliance
    • Hardened appliance option for session management
    • Licensed separately from Identity Manager
  • Active Roles$undefined/year
    • Priced per managed Active Directory account
    • Delegated administration and automated provisioning
    • Licensed separately

Which should you pick?

Choose Dagger if

  • You need pipelines as code.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, macOS, Windows, Self-hosted.
  • You also want local and ci parity.
Dagger review

Choose One Identity if

  • You need identity manager.
  • You work on Web, Windows, Linux.
  • You also want safeguard.
One Identity review

Questions people ask

Is Dagger or One Identity better?
Neither clearly leads. Dagger starts at Free and One Identity at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Dagger or One Identity?
Dagger has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at Free for Dagger and On request for One Identity.
Does Dagger or One Identity run on more platforms?
Dagger runs on Linux, macOS, Windows, Self-hosted. One Identity runs on Web, Windows, Linux.
Can I use Dagger for free?
Yes. Dagger has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. One Identity starts at On request.
What is Dagger best used for?
Dagger is most often used for a platform team maintaining near-identical build yaml across forty repositories that wants one versioned module every repository calls instead, an engineering organisation migrating off a ci provider that does not want to rewrite every pipeline as part of the migration, a team whose engineers waste hours pushing commits to debug ci-only failures and needs to reproduce the exact run locally, a monorepo where most commits touch a small subset of services and cache-accurate step skipping cuts build minutes materially. Of those, a platform team maintaining near-identical build yaml across forty repositories that wants one versioned module every repository calls instead and an engineering organisation migrating off a ci provider that does not want to rewrite every pipeline as part of the migration are not what One Identity is typically brought in for.
What can Dagger do that One Identity cannot?
Dagger covers Pipelines as code, Local and CI parity, Content-addressed caching, Dagger Functions and modules. One Identity covers Identity Manager, Safeguard, Active Roles, OneLogin.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Dagger: Does Dagger replace GitHub Actions?

No. Dagger runs inside GitHub Actions or any other CI. It replaces the YAML that describes your pipeline steps, not the trigger and runner layer.

One Identity: Is One Identity the same company as Quest?

Yes. One Identity is Quest Software's identity and access management business unit, not a separate vendor.

Dagger: Is the engine open source?

Yes, the Dagger engine and SDKs are open source and free. Dagger Cloud, the observability product, is what costs money.

One Identity: Does it include privileged access?

Safeguard provides it, but it is licensed separately from Identity Manager. Neither includes the other.

Dagger: What is an event in the pricing?

Dagger Cloud meters pipeline telemetry events. One million per month is free; the Team plan at 50 USD per month allows ten million.

One Identity: Why choose this over SailPoint or Saviynt?

Almost always because of Active Directory depth via Active Roles or an appliance requirement for privileged sessions. For cloud-first estates the specialists are the stronger choice.

Dagger: Can I run the same pipeline on my laptop?

Yes, that is the main reason teams adopt it. The dagger CLI executes the identical graph locally, so CI-only failures become reproducible.

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