As much as we try to avoid viruses and malware, we are bound to come in contact with them at some point in our computer usage. There are many ways to really lower you risk, however, it is almost impossible to completely avoid all viruses and malware. This is why you need to have a good antivirus software package installed on your computer.
Not everyone has the money or the desire to spend money on antivirus subscriptions. Luckily, there are a ton of great and free antivirus tools available. Let’s take a look at some of the top free antivirus software.
Microsoft Security Essentials
This free antivirus software from Microsoft is quite good and it keeps improving over time. In fact, I like this one so much that I choose to use it. It does a great job detecting potential problems and it works really well with Windows. When you use a free antivirus software, you lose some of the extra features that the paid antivirus software offers. However, this does not affect how effective MSE is at detecting and removing threats.
Although Microsoft Security Essentials doesn’t have a ton of extras, it does have a few that I like. First, it has a feature that allows you to schedule your antivirus scans and to set a certain amount of CPU usage for the scan. This can help keep your computer running at ok speeds during a scan. Another cool feature is that it allows you to exclude certain files, file extensions, or even processes. I could see this becoming helpful if you have a program or file that continues to through a false positive.
Here is a link to Microsoft Security Essentials
Avira Free AntiVirus
Avira Free AntiVirus is another solid and free antivirus software. Before I switched to MSE, this was my free antivirus of choice. Avira Free AntiVirus has a huge database of threats that it looks for. Avira Free AntiVirus will not only find viruses, but it will also find other malware, spyware, and adware. I do find Avira Free AntiVirus to be a little bit harder to use than a few of the other free tools. However, this extra difficulty also means it has more customization opportunities.
Click Here to Download Avira Free Antivirus
Avast! Free Antivirus
Another great antivirus is Avast! Free Antivirus. Avast! is very good at detecting and removing viruses. Avast boosts an advanced detection engine that they say leads to great detection rates. This engine detects patterns to help find and remove malware that isn’t even in the malware definitions yet. Based on many user reviews, I would also agree that their advanced detection engine does its job well.
To go along with its good detection and removal rates, Avast! Free Antivirus has a ton of extra features. It includes a silent mode, a scan scheduler, and real-time scanning of email, instant messaging, and peer-to-peer networking. The downside of this software is that it can be a bit slow at times.
AVG Antivirus Free
AVG Antivirus is one more free antivirus program that you can’t go wrong with. AVG Anti-Virus Free is a full-fledged antivirus tool that includes a link scanner, an email scanner, scheduled scanning, and more. To go along with its comprehensive set of features, AVG does a great job when it comes to detecting and removing threats. This software also seems to be pretty easy to use and zippy.
Click Here to Download AVG Antivirus
There are a ton of threats to your PC today. Due to these threats, you need a solid antivirus. If you choose one of the antivirus software packages from this list, you can’t really go wrong.
Have another free antivirus software you would like to share? Let us know in the comments!