Azure IAM, LLC answers how much Microsoft Entra ID Governance costs per licensed user: the 7 dollar add-on, the P1 or P2 prerequisite that makes it 14 for some tenants, who gets counted, and how a Microsoft Identity Manager estate should model the bill.
-- Every budget for retiring Microsoft Identity Manager (MIM) eventually hits the same line item: how much does Microsoft Entra ID Governance cost per licensed user? Azure IAM, LLC, an independent identity consulting firm that migrates MIM estates, says the list price is simple and the total is not. The firm's services are described at https://azureiam.com/.
The list price. Microsoft's Entra pricing page lists Entra ID Governance at 7 dollars per user per month on an annual subscription. It is an add-on, not a directory license. Microsoft's licensing documentation requires the tenant to hold an active product that contains the Entra ID P1 or P2 service plan, such as Entra ID P1 itself, Microsoft 365 E3 or E5, or Enterprise Mobility + Security E3 or E5. Without that prerequisite the Governance subscription cannot be purchased, and if the prerequisite lapses, governance features stop working.
Why 7 dollars for some tenants and 14 for others. A tenant on Microsoft 365 E3 or E5 already owns P1 or P2, so Governance adds 7 dollars to a bill that already exists. A tenant with no premium Entra plan must buy P1 at 7 dollars first, which makes the real incremental cost 14 dollars per user per month. Many MIM estates fall into the second group: identity ran on premises, and the cloud directory was a synchronization target rather than a licensed platform. A tenant already on P2, now 10 dollars, buys a product Microsoft calls Entra ID Governance Step Up for Entra ID P2; the public pricing page publishes no list price for it, so that figure comes from a partner quote. Entra Suite, at 12 dollars, bundles Governance with Private Access, Internet Access, ID Protection, and Verified ID, and it also requires P1 underneath.
Which users must be counted. Microsoft does not require a Governance license to be assigned to each person. The tenant must instead hold enough licenses to cover every member user who is in scope of a governance feature or who configures one. For access reviews that means every employee who reviews access and every employee whose access is reviewed. A Contoso with 8,000 employees that runs one annual all-staff certification needs 8,000 Governance licenses even if lifecycle workflows only touch new hires. Guests are not counted in that number; they bill at 75 cents per monthly active guest on a linked Azure subscription, a separate model Azure IAM has documented on its own.
What the 7 dollars buys that P2 does not. Governance contains everything P2 shipped for identity governance, including Privileged Identity Management, entitlement management, and access reviews, plus the features Microsoft now reserves for the add-on: Lifecycle Workflows, access package auto-assignment policies, machine learning assisted reviews, inactive guest reviews, custom extensions through Logic Apps, cross-tenant group synchronization, and Account Discovery. Microsoft has stated that no new identity governance capabilities will be added to P2. The practical consequence is that P1 plus Governance at 14 dollars delivers PIM and every governance feature. P2 adds Identity Protection risk policies and risk-based Conditional Access, not governance.
The MIM translation. MIM 2016 is licensed through Windows Server client access licenses and carries no per identity governance charge, so a MIM shop has never seen a number like this. Azure IAM's arithmetic for the same Contoso: 8,000 employees with no premium Entra plan today is 8,000 times 14 dollars times twelve, or 1,344,000 dollars a year at list price before enterprise agreement discounts. The same estate already on Microsoft 365 E3 is 8,000 times 7 dollars times twelve, or 672,000 dollars. That is the line the migration budget compares against a SailPoint IdentityIQ or Identity Security Cloud quote, which is priced per governed identity under a negotiated agreement, and against the cost of keeping MIM, which Microsoft supports under Service Pack 2 until January 10, 2029.
Four ways to keep the number honest. First, inventory which populations each feature actually touches before counting, since a tenant that reviews only privileged roles licenses a far smaller set than one that certifies all staff. Second, ask the licensing partner about the Frontline Worker Governance product for F1 and F3 populations, which has its own prerequisite and price. Third, price Entra Suite when two or more of its other components are already on the roadmap, because the 5 dollar difference over standalone Governance can replace a separate secure access vendor. Fourth, keep P2 era features where they are sufficient and reserve the add-on for the populations that need lifecycle automation or advanced reviews.
The decision. For an estate already on Microsoft 365 E3 or E5 with a modest governance scope, the 7 dollar add-on is often the simplest path off MIM. For an estate with no premium Entra plan and a large all-staff review obligation, the 14 dollar figure changes the comparison with SailPoint and with a planned MIM extension. Azure IAM models the per user bill against the actual population counts and review cadences of a MIM estate as part of a fixed fee assessment; a consultation request at https://azureiam.com/contact is the first step.
Contact Info:
Name: Robin Lilly
Email: Send Email
Organization: Azure IAM, LLC
Address: 2521 North Main Unit 1-276, Las Cruces, New Mexico 88001, United States
Website: https://azureiam.com
Source: NewsNetwork
Release ID: 89208254
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