Respected test lab AV-Test has just released its latest set of results for popular antivirus solutions. Testing involves 23 products in a Windows 7 environment.
*If your antivirus is not included, it means the vendor/developer did not submit its product for testing.
So let’s take a look and analyze some of the results:
- Protection – includes against both zero day malware attacks and widespread/prevalent malware
- Performance – rates overall impact on computer speed in terms of day to day usage
- Usability – basically looks at numbers of false positives encountered over 4 main areas (lower is better)
These scores are then compared to an industry standard to ascertain the final rating. Of the 23 products tested, surprisingly 10 products achieved 100% score in both areas of protection:
Five of those top ten products also achieved a perfect score (0 seconds) in performance, a result that I find bordering on unbelievable. Personally, I find it difficult to accept that any AV, and especially the likes of Norton and McAfee, would have zero impact on a computer’s performance.
Only one free antivirus is included among the 100 percenters, Panda Cloud Antivirus Free, and it also scores very well for Performance and Usability. A great result for Panda. The only other free solutions included are AVG and Avast, both of which finished down the list in terms of protection (97% and 96.5% respectively). Remarkably, AVG’s premium antivirus solution, AVG Internet Security 2014, actually scored less for protection than its free sibling, on equal standing with Avast free.
I should point out that there is not lot of difference in the protection scores between the top seventeen products. You can check out the results in full here: http://www.av-test.org/en/
- Click the Home User box:
- Then scroll down the page until you see “Windows 7” displayed and click that item:
For expanded details regarding each antivirus, click on the right facing triangle at far right.
Thanks for the updates on a regular basis, much appreciated Jim.
I had ‘a person’ ask me a couple of weeks ago how to get information on the best anti-virus programme, so I recommended DCT forum, DCT Facebook, or at least AV-Test Labs, even gave the Internet addresses.
The reply was, “No point taking advice from ‘these sites’, the administrators are paid to give good results, that’s why the best programmes never stay on top of the list.”
The end has come for me ‘leading horses to the water trough’.
Regards,
Jonno
It has always struck me that the same old names crop up again and again. I switched to Comodo Internet Security after reading some good reviews of it. So far it has not let me down but I never see it mentioned in magazines or reviews. I previously used AVAST and had no end of problems with it. I found on average it too more than a week to get a response from their support team (I had the paid version) and whenever they did respond their first solution was to uninstall and re-install!
Clive, if the same names crop up again and again it is an indication of consistently good results/performance, is it not?
There really isn’t that much difference between the top 17 or so products, the interesting aspect for me is how the Free AVs perform when compared with each other and their commercial counterparts.
I so agree with you on the uninstall/re-install advice, that should be the last resort not first response.
I used Spyware Doctor (SD) for 10 years until Norton (NIS) took them over, and I am glad they took them over. SD would do a great job, but at times when doing updates or back ground stuff, it would slow my machine to a crawl and I hated that and sometimes I would reboot my box just to stop it for another time when I didnt need it. Since using NIS for about a year now, I have had no such issues. On the occasional time I heard the HD revving a bit I would check processes, and see NIS was using a little CPU usage, but not enough to slow my machine at all. So I can accept the findings above. Thanks NIS.
To save adding a second post regarding Firefox… Was an Avid FF user for many years and switched to Chrome 5 years ago because FF was getting to darn bloated. Now I find Chrome using way to much CPU to the extent if I have two Chrome browser windows open, my poor laptop is pedal to the metal… now switching back to FF.
Hi Jim…
I must renew my subscription to Norton Antivirus in 5 days and i see that Panda Free is a wonderful performer with excellent scores so i just might dump Norton and go with Panda Free. What do you think? I’ve been using Norton for 3 yrs and have yet to cross around any issues or malware infections. It has provided me with excellent protection and nothing negative at all to say. It doesn’t slow down my PC at all likes others have stated so i am very pleased with Norton. Only one issue, it’s not free and i must dish-out $49.95 to get it for 1 yr and 1 PC. It’s really not a bad deal but still quite a sum for protection. What do you have to say about Panda Free compared to Norton? Hope to hear from you soon and thanks for the advice. Just in case I’ve expressed myself in a not so accurate way, English is my second language. Thanks God for spell-check… Ha ha ha … Again, thanks……..
Hola George – I am pretty sure your English is a heck of a lot better than my Spanish. 🙂
I don’t really like to recommend which antivirus people should use, it is entirely dependent on the individual and his/her levels of computer expertise and security awareness.
For those who are security conscious, don’t tend to visit dangerous sites, and are generally aware of the risks, I would say that one of the free antivirus programs would suffice.
On the other hand, people who are not computer or security savvy would generally be better off with one of the commercial antivirus programs. For those users, a commercial antivirus is pretty cheap insurance, generally less expensive than a visit to the computer repair shop to fix malware problems. 🙂
Hope that helps,
Cheers… Jim
I test out a lot of antivirus software with new malware and ransom packs when they update and I would not say Norton ,mcafee .panda , trend micro , avira was that good as you rated them.
Joe, WE did not rate anything. I believe – if we are reading the same article – that the tests (and associated rankings) were performed by AV-Test.org.
oh sorry didn’t mean you guys I meant av-test.org on the ranking.