Best Free Antivirus: Avast vs. Avira vs. Kaspersky vs. AVG vs. Malwarebytes?

Top 5 Best Free Antivirus Software (2024)

There used to be a lot of free antivirus software providers, but in recent years they have mostly turned into paid services. With the highest levels of cybercrime, antivirus protection has never been more important. Finding the best antivirus can be a confusing task, so here you can compare antivirus reviews to get the best antivirus for your security needs.

Comparison of the Best Free Antiviruses

Avast vs. Avira vs. Kaspersky vs. AVG vs. Malwarebytes

If you think effective antivirus software costs a lot of money, you'll be happy to know that you can get it completely free. It's not a scam either: Many security software makers offer their core antivirus protection for free.

Of course, they do keep some advanced features or extra tools (like a password manager) so that only paying customers get the full set of features.

Most of the software here is available for Windows, macOS, Android, and iOS, although you tend to see fewer features on iOS. Windows users tend to get the most, but since it's all free, you can install it on as many devices as you want.

Windows comes with Defender, and you might be surprised to find that it's just as powerful (if not better) protection than you get from paid antivirus software. It's certainly an easy option if you use Windows, but know that it doesn't have some of the extra features you get elsewhere, like a browser add-on that warns you of fake websites to protect you from phishing attacks.

Bitdefender Antivirus Free used to be one of our top recommendations, but unfortunately, the company no longer offers it. All you can get right now is a trial version of Total Security.

Which free antivirus is best for me?

Avast One Essential

Avast Free Antivirus, for a long time one of our favourite antivirus tools, has been replaced by a new edition called Avast One.

The Avast One Essential package is completely free for Windows, macOS, Android and iOS. Features vary from version to version, but all platforms get core protection and add web shields, great ransomware, firewall modules and a free VPN.

Yes, the built-in VPN provides only 5GB of bandwidth per week. Quite a few well-known paid security suites offer less than that, so for free, this is great, and it's super fast, making it ideal for the occasional trip to the coffee shop.

The bad news is that you can't choose from Avast One Premium's list of 35 countries. It just connects to the fastest location, which is usually in your own country, so it won’t unblock websites or streaming services for you.

For the full Avast experience you’ll need to buy a premium licence. An individual subscription costs $50 per year and covers up to five devices, with unlimited VPN usage, plus various optional security components. There’s also a family subscription option, which has the same features but covers six user accounts across up to 30 devices for $69 per year.

Still, the free version is useful enough. The first job is of course virus protection, and the Avast One is hard to criticize here. 

In the latest test from independent security lab AV-Comparatives.org, the Avast engine provided an excellent 99.8% protection when connected to the Internet—slightly higher than Microsoft Defender's 99.6%. AV-Test.org achieved better results, reporting that Avast scored 100% against unknown zero-day threats and prevalent malware in the first two months of 2024. This puts Avast on par with the best paid security suites.

Avast One Essential bundles a fairly wide range of features. It warns you away from dodgy web pages and includes a fully secure custom browser for accessing banking or shopping sites. For maximum protection, you can run your browser in “Bank Mode”, which opens a securely isolated desktop that other programs can't spy on.

The Windows edition of Avast One also includes a nifty custom firewall which monitors your network traffic, and aims to prevent both hackers penetrating your system and malware phoning home, and a ransomware protection feature that blocks untrusted processes from writing to your personal folders. 

Other free features include password protection, which checks whether your credentials have leaked online, and a system speedup module that can kill processes that run needlessly in the background.

Avast One Essential's interface is attractive and easy to use. It's divided into several well-defined tabs, and the free version doesn't indulge too much in annoying bait-and-switch tricks.

Avast One Essential has less impact on system performance. Previously Avast slowed us down a little more than average, but this time we found no measurable difference at all. At least it's possible that installing and setting up Avast One could leave your system faster than it was before.

Avast can’t give absolutely everything away for free and what you get with One Essential is surprisingly generous. It’s our new top pick for free antivirus software.

Get Avast One Essential

Pros:

Impeccable virus protection

A great set of free features

Generally user friendly

5GB VPN usage per week

Does not slow down the computer

Cons:

Some features require you to upgrade

More limited protection for Android and iOS

AVG AntiVirus Free

Bought by rival Avast in 2016, AVG’s anti-malware suites use the same detection engine as its stablemate, but with a different interface and a slightly different range of integrated tools.

If you need basic protection, AVG AntiVirus Free is a great option. It performs 24/7 scans to detect rootkits, malware, spyware, and even has advanced ransomware protection. You can install it on all popular operating systems, including Windows, macOS, Android, and iOS.

The premium version, AVG Internet Security, costs $46.68 for the first year to protect one Mac or one PC. AVG advertises this as a 43% discount, so expect the renewal price to be closer to $69.99. 

In lab tests performed by AV-Comparatives in March 2024, we can see that the malware protection rate of AVG Antivirus reaches 99.98%, outperforming such services as Avira, McAfee, and ESET. It also spotted 10 false positives, and considering that a year before it spotted twice more, this is an improvement.

Additionally, another independent testing lab, AV-Test, examined the antivirus protection, performance, and usability. AVG scored 6 out of 6 points in each category during the tests in February, 2024. These are outstanding results that speak up for themselves.

AVG Free Antivirus also offers phishing protection. It blocks suspicious links, websites and email attachments to prevent data or financial loss and malware penetration. Equally impressive, the free version includes the wifi Inspector feature, which checks your home network for intruders.

AVG AntiVirus Free includes a file shredder tool as well. You're asked during setup to also install AVG's web browser, AVG Secure Browser, but you can uncheck that option if you want.

AVG Antivirus is very easy to use. Download the free version in just a few clicks, no account required. You can customize AVG's components during installation, and you can see advertisements for partner software during the installation of AVG Free. There's nothing too obtrusive here, and there's no mandatory installation of potentially unwanted components.

However, it does have a noticeable impact on page-loading times, with AV-Test recording an average of 30% slower compared to having no antivirus installed, and an industry average slowdown of 17%.

Unlike Avast One Essential, there’s no VPN so although this is still a decent option if you’re after free antivirus, there’s better available these days.

Pros:

• Excellent scores from three labs

• Ransomware defence

       Some useful bonus features

• Choose what to enable during setup.

• Updates automatically (definitions and the program).

Cons:

• Heavier on system resources than Avast or Microsoft Defender

• Initial scan slower than average

      No VPN

• Shows features you can't enable in the free version.

• Always advertises AVG Internet Security.

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Get AVG Free AntiVirus here.

Avira Free Security

Avira is a German company which has offered free antivirus software for as long as we can remember. The Germany-based firm which has a large European user base was acquired in 2020 by NortonLifeLock, which has kept the brand independent.

Avira has offered a free standalone antivirus and a free suite for the past few years. The current product, Avira Free Security, replaces both. 

The previous suite at times resembled a loose federation of separate Avira products, with plenty of nagging screens prompting to upgrade to the paid version. The current product is significantly more integrated and it is now more friendly to non-technical users, though the upsell screens are still around.

If you can live with this, and many people will then it’s nice that you don’t have to hand over any personal information at all – not even an email address – which is rare in this day and age.

Upgrade to Avira Prime, which costs $59.99 a year—it's a little more expensive than some competitors, but it's one of the best antivirus suites for 2024. Avira offers a 60-day money-back guarantee on all annual subscriptions.

Avira Free Security  fully operates in the cloud, meaning its detection and analysis don’t actually take place on your PC. This makes Avira extremely fast, lightweight, and low on system resources.

Avira Free Security performed mediocrely  in AV-Test’s real-world tests, scoring 99% one month and 100% the next. It protected the test system in 100% of AV-Comparatives’ test exposures though. However, the most damning result same from SE Labs’ late-2021 tests, where it got a protection rating of 93%, as it was compromised by three of 100 threats, and had to neutralize one after infection. It’s by no means ineffective against the latest malware, but most of its rivals are just a bit better.

Here’s what you get if you download the free version of Avira Antivirus:

• Virus scans

• Real-time protection

• Phantom VPN with 500MB of monthly data

• File quarantine

• Avira Safe Shopping plug-in

• Avira Password Manager

• File shredder

Pros:

• Many features beyond basic antivirus

• Feature-limited VPN

• Simple password manager

• Free

Cons:

• Many features require payment for full functionality

• Poor scores in some hands-on tests

Get Avira Free Security here.

 Kaspersky Security Cloud (Free)

Kaspersky Security Cloud Free takes a different tack by protecting computers from above. Its free protection covers PCs, Androids and iOS devices by combining virus shields with a password manager and limited VPN access. The free service includes up to 15 password entries and 300MB a day of VPN communications.

Kaspersky software is banned for use by U.S. government agencies and defense contractors, and there have been allegations that the Moscow-based company spies on behalf of the Russian authorities. We have not seen any convincing evidence that Kaspersky does so, and we think the software is fine for civilian use.

Whether you get Kaspersky Security Cloud Free or pay for Kaspersky software, you get the same excellent protection against malware.

The latest version of Kaspersky Security Cloud Free includes a tool called System Watcher that watches for ransomware attacks and can reverse changes to files. On the downside, Kaspersky Security Cloud Free has no specific defense against UEFI penetration of the system's start-up program.

If the scanning gets in the way of gaming or watching video, Kaspersky Security Cloud Free's gaming mode can reduce interruptions.

Scans are quick and easy to start. A Full Scan is two clicks from Kaspersky's main page, and a Quick Scan is one more click. Right-clicking a specific object in Windows Explorer lets you scan it, and when you plug in a USB flash drive, Kaspersky Security Cloud Free scans it behind the scenes.

Pros:

• Perfect or near-perfect scores from four independent testing labs

• Effective ransomware protection

• Very good score in our phishing protection test

• Good scores in our malware-blocking test

• Support for Android and iOS

• Free

Cons:

• No direct tech support

• Features for iOS limited

Get up to 50% cashback on Kaspersky UK.

Malwarebytes Free 

Malwarebytes Free is a good choice for users looking for a simple antivirus scanner that they can install and forget about. Malwarebytes’s virus scanner uses a virus database as well as heuristics to catch all types of malware — and it performed pretty well in my tests, detecting around 90% of the malware files I hid on my PC. However, it did miss a few well-hidden files that competitors like Norton and TotalAV detected.

Apart from the scanner, Malwarebytes Free also comes with a browser extension that protects against a wide range of threats, including malware, ads and trackers, scams, and PUPs. One of the things I like the most about this extension is that all of the protections are turned on by default, so there’s nothing for you to do (but you can easily turn off one or all of the protections).

In my tests, Malwarebytes’s browser extension blocked the majority of risky sites I attempted to visit, scoring a 90% phishing detection rate. However, the extension wasn’t as accurate at blocking ads — I visited dozens of sites filled with ads, and Malwarebytes blocked only around a third of the ads.

Malwarebytes’s free plan is a simple virus scanner with a good phishing tool, but it unfortunately doesn’t have real-time malware protection. To get real-time scanning, you’ll need to upgrade to Malwarebytes Premium, which provides coverage for up to 5 devices and starts at $39.99 / year. Malwarebytes Premium + Privacy also adds a good VPN for $99.99 / year. Both of Malwarebytes’s premium plans are covered by a generous 60-day money-back guarantee

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