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Free antivirus solutions for Windows

What is the preferred AntiVirus software package for Windows these days?

Please choose only one package based on minimal impact on performance and its AV effectiveness. If it's already listed as an answer, please up-vote your favorite so that there aren't multiple entries of the same package to have to weed through.

Thanks!

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see also stackoverflow.com/questions/1305709/… – Ian Ringrose Sep 18 '09 at 10:43
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Duplicate - superuser.com/questions/2/free-antivirus-solutions-for-windows (largely) – ChrisF Oct 31 '09 at 20:40
So now questions that are more than a year old are migrated...? (Or: please interpret "these days" as September 2008?) – Arjan Oct 31 '09 at 21:34
This post would be moderately helpful to me if the question that this topic was closed for wasn't closed as well. – ekaj Apr 25 at 0:48
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migrated from stackoverflow.com Oct 31 '09 at 20:02

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closed as exact duplicate by random♦ Aug 3 '10 at 2:51

This question covers exactly the same ground as earlier questions on this topic; its answers may be merged with another identical question. See the FAQ for guidance on how to improve it.

17 Answers

up vote 9 down vote

Somebody vote Norton so we can downmod them 100 times. Norton sucks.

I use AVG 8.0 (Free edition) but I turn off active scanning. I'm smart enough not to click on dancing bunnies and solicitations in my email to "increase my manhood."

The daily scan helps though if something does happen to get in there.

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Edit this post 5 times to put it into community mode and then we can downvote it without affecting your rep. – Sam Hasler Sep 9 '08 at 21:41
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up vote 7 down vote

Microsoft Security Essentials is sound, light, and free.

MSE screenshot

http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials/

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up vote 6 down vote

I use avast! (home edition), it's free and doesn't eat up all your system resources.

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One thing I like about avast is that it doesn't use the normal system of scheduling a daily or weekly scan. Instead, you set it up to scan while your screen saver is running. (This is in addition to real-time, of course). – Joel Coehoorn Sep 10 '08 at 13:43
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up vote 5 down vote

I'm happy user of the Eset NOD32. Low memory and CPU usage, good detection.

I was using AVG before but compared it NOD32 is almost undetectable (regarding CPU use).

It aint free, though, and because of that I'm still using AVG on less used computers.

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Yep, NOD32 is probably the best out there right now. Don't trust AVG or Norton, whatever you do. – Lee B Nov 1 '09 at 0:32
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up vote 1 down vote

I used to use AVG, but it started to get bloated and slow. I now use Avira AntiVir and I'm very happy with it. Although it does get false positives occassionally, I have reported them and they were fixed within an update or two.

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up vote 1 down vote

Smart programmers don't intall anti-virus, unless they have a client or employer that specifically requires it.

It doesn't protect as well as advertised. Running with lower privileges, regular patching, using a firewall, conscious installation of software are a better basis for security.

This notion of that minimal CPU and memory are the primary performance killers is also flawed. Look at the disk I/O after installing antivirus software. The disk is pegged by antivirus software more often than CPU or memory, both of which are plentiful in most current PCs.

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Those are all good suggestions, but I had to mod your comment down because assuming that your antivirus etc. are reliable is dumb. If you run windows, you need antivirus, and it's pretty irresponsible not to have it. Other platforms are more trustworthy, and less targetted, and Linux (well Debian-based) systems have a vastly more secure software installation system, so you don't need to worry so much there. – Lee B Nov 1 '09 at 0:36
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up vote 1 down vote

Perhaps belatedly, a vote here for Sophos. I've used it in various forms for about a decade. It's not cheap, and it's aimed at a more corporate market I guess, but I've seen it successfully find interlopers and clean-up machines that Norton had either declared clean or had given-up on. It has Windows and Mac clients and a half-decent enterprise roll-out and update system, too.

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up vote 1 down vote

Hopefully the person who suggested Windows Defender got Downvoted because Windows Defender is not an antivirus application, since I'm going to suggest something related.

I'm pretty happy so far with Microsoft Security Essentials, which replaces Windows Defender but includes antivirus functionality in addition to antispyware. It seems to have minimal impact, and downloads updates using the Windows Update process.

I practice safe computing as well and rarely encounter an actual virus so I really don't know how to comment on the effectiveness of any particular solution. I've used AVG, Norton (yuck), MacAfee (yuck), and CA Antivirus (used to be good but the last version caused me some problems). I'm not comfortable with the "use nothing" advice-- I have seen plenty of systems with viruses, and they all had no antivirus software or outdated antivirus software.

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up vote 0 down vote

I currently use and recommend Avira.

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up vote 0 down vote

Windows Defender

I don't prefer anti-virus suites in general and black-list or signature based detection is fairly weak. Windows Defender scores well in performance.

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Windows Defender only appears to protect against spyware, not viruses. – Thomas Owens Sep 9 '08 at 18:57
Good call Thomas, although I think the line is blurry, especially to the common PC user. – Anthony Mastrean Sep 9 '08 at 19:00
That is true. I personally think spyware (including some types of viruses like keyloggers and botnet viruses) might be more damaging than a virus that cripples your machine for a few days, while you reformat and reinstall everything. – Thomas Owens Sep 9 '08 at 19:08
See above - Microsoft Security Essentials now does everything Windows Defender did plus viruses. – davidcl Nov 11 '09 at 22:01
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up vote 0 down vote

I did an extensive amount of research last year and finally settled on Kaspersky for its low performance impact, high detection rate, clean UI, excellent reviews, and flexible licensing (I use Business Space Security to secure all the desktops, laptops, and server in my home network). I have been very happy with it and highly recommend it to others.

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up vote 0 down vote

According to the link text community,

Which Is the Best Antivirus Application? Avira AntiVir

7.8% (2406 votes) Kaspersky Anti-Virus

16.9% (5227 votes) Avast Antivirus

15.5% (4798 votes) AVG Anti-Virus

29.4% (9069 votes) NOD32

23.0% (7092 votes) Other

7.4% (2300 votes)

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up vote 0 down vote

ClamWin - free and open source

http://www.clamwin.com/

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up vote -1 down vote

For my money, has to be Grisoft's AVG

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up vote -1 down vote

I've been very happy with AVast. It's free for home use.

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up vote -1 down vote

Someone just told me about BitDefender - it seems to have received some good reviews. Anyone know anything about it?

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up vote -2 down vote

RANU and don't click stuff you don't know.

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