Over the course of my career in content marketing and journalism, I’ve had the opportunity to work on dozens of data-driven projects, and Businesses at Work is by far the most extensive and in depth. From kick-off to launch, the process takes over eight months and involves subject matter experts from across the company. 

Every year, these experts dive into our rich pool of anonymized customer data to identify the latest tech trends for the report. This year is no exception. In our 2023 edition, we’ll walk you through the apps, tools, and cloud platforms that teams worldwide rely on to stay productive, innovative, and secure. 

This year’s report shows how companies across industries are navigating economic uncertainty and the tools they’re choosing to augment their approach. Some categories of apps are seeing explosive growth, while others are slowing as organizations shift their priorities. 

The full report will give you a deep dive into all of our findings. But if you’re short on time, we’ve got the top three takeaways for you here: 

Organizations double down on efficiency and automation 

Several recurring themes emerge from the data, including a growing focus on automation and efficiency. For instance, this year’s fastest growing app, mobile device management platform Kandji, allows IT and security administrators to automate repetitive device management tasks and ensure user devices meet security and compliance requirements. 

Kandji’s incredible 172% year-over-year customer growth and impressive growth across the entire category of device management platforms suggests that companies are looking to do more with less, while also enabling employees to work securely from anywhere. 

We also see the growing adoption of Okta Workflows — our no-code tool that makes it easy to automate Identity-management processes at scale. Usage of Okta Workflows is rising across a variety of industries. Tech leads the way, but other sectors are starting to catch up. In the second half of 2022, the healthcare and pharmaceuticals sector as well as finance and banking saw more than 50% growth in the number of customers using workflows. 



Hybrid work drives cloud-first solutions

To support productivity no matter where it happens, companies continue to turn to cloud apps and tools. In fact, large organizations, with at least 2,000 employees, continue to add new apps, averaging 211 each in 2022. 

We also see companies supplementing their productivity suites with best-of-breed apps such as Zoom, Slack, and Box. For example, this year’s report reveals that nearly half (48%) of Okta's Microsoft 365 customers also deploy Zoom, 42% deploy Google Workspace, and 36% deploy Slack.

A move towards Identity-based security and higher assurance factors

While supporting hybrid work is a big priority for our customers, so is keeping that work secure. It's no surprise that deployment of security tools grew 23% YoY by number of customers and 43% YoY by unique users.

Businesses at Work also shows us that security strategies are evolving. More organizations are realizing that not all multi-factor authentication (MFA) is created equal, and they’re seeking higher-assurance factors in their MFA solutions. 

Low-assurance security questions are experiencing the slowest growth across the board (3% YoY by number of customers), while high-assurance security keys and biometrics (including WebAuthn) are growing more quickly (46% YoY by number of customers and a chart-topping 211% by unique users). And Okta Verify, our high-assurance factor that includes Push and FastPass, is now deployed by 88% of Okta customers.



As for what the next year holds, only time will tell. But we’re betting on more automation, the continued growth of best-of-breed apps, and more momentum behind higher-assurance factors as companies seek to do more with less and secure their workforces against new security threats.