One way to look at it is this: Anything that’s free is a good deal.
Another way is: If it’s free, you get what you pay for.
Both of these attitudes hold true when it comes to free virus protections. One might be pretty potent at keeping your computer nice and clean, while another might be about as powerful a firewall as a piece of wet tissue paper.
Luckily, that’s what we’re here for- To help you sort out the good stuff from the junk. Below, we’ll list a couple of the free virus protectors that impressed us the most based on a few things; virus database, protection methods, features, and how often the software gets updated.
AVG Free
AVG Free offers users a choice between a free edition, and one you have to pay for. You might be thinking “Oh well then, they probably give the cheapskates the junky version!” but no, the free edition really isn’t bad!
The free edition provides you with daily updates, Safe Search and Safe Surf, which both work to prevent your browser from visiting dangerous sites, and full protection against viruses and spyware.
The paid edition gives you a few extra features, and is mainly geared towards protecting identity theft. If you don’t want to shell out for that, you can always just practice common sense and be careful about sharing sensitive personal data.
Avira AntiVir Personal
Avira AntiVir Personal is pretty impressive. Not just pretty impressive for a free antivirus package, but pretty impressive for an antivirus package, period. Spam blocker, anti-spyware, email protection, firewall, and effective malware blocking. What we really like is that it works in real time. As in, you don’t have to do a virus scan now and then, but rather, whenever you have the software running, it’s on the hunt for viruses. And no, it doesn’t eat up too much RAM.
Avira is also pushing Premium and Security Suite versions of the package, and you do get more features with them, but you’ll probably find everything you need in the free edition.
Avira does get regular updates, just like AVG, though maybe not quite daily. However, you will get updates as often as they’re needed. You won’t be sitting around for a year waiting for Avira to update their database or anything.
Both Avira and AVG have a good, wide database of viruses and malware, and both companies are constantly updating the database. We could pick a winner, but you know what? They’re free, why not use them both?
