I'm creating a SSL certificate for an ADFS server. It will be used to sign-into various sites that support Single Sign On.

I'm at the point of the process where I need to choose a name for the host such as


I don't think it's technically possible to have the SSO engine work like this, but can have a redirect accomplish it.



  • Is there a preferred hostname for federation servers such as ADFS?

Some hostnames I considered include login, signin, sso, auth, saml, nycsso12 (in decreasing order of friendliness)

  • identity.company.com (my personal preference). – user42730 Sep 21 '14 at 7:14

Active Directory Federation Service (ADFS) has nothing to do with the URL on your site. ADFS is a technique to build trust between two different Active Directory domains to share resources across different networks.

If you have a full trust duplicate direction trust between Company A and Company B, these companies use their previous sign-in pages. When signed in, they can access the AD trusted company's on the same URL/IP.

Using http://adfs.company-a.com as sign in address, could be done, but makes no sense for the user. ADFS is a technical term and should be avoided. Instead use redirections if users try to access resources when they're not signed in. Upon successful login, redirect back to the requested page for the best possible user experience.

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