Antivirus software is nearly as crucial as a PC’s operating system. Even if you’re well aware of potential threats and practice extreme caution, some threats just can’t be prevented without the extra help of an AV program—or a full antivirus suite.
Internet security software provides all-in-one protection. The best Internet security software typically includes three essential components -- antivirus, anti-spyware and a firewall -- along with optional features, such as a spam filter and parental controls. The earliest form of malware was the computer virus, the name for a program that infects other programs with its code, and replicates when the infected program runs. Many early viruses had no. After all our testing and research, we feel Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac is the best antivirus protection for Mac users. It does a good job detecting and protecting against threats, including Windows malware.
Antivirus suite cheat sheet
Our quick-hit recommendations:
Read on to learn why these products rank best.
You could, for example, visit a website that unintentionally displays malicious ads. Or accidentally click on a phishing email (it happens!). Or get stung by a zero-day threat, where an undisclosed bug in Windows, your browser, or an installed program gives hackers entry to your system.
We’re not suggesting that PC security software is fool-proof. Antivirus software often can’t do much to stop zero-day exploits, for example. But it can detect when the undisclosed vulnerability is used to install other nasty bits, like ransomware, on your machine. Anyone who actively uses email, clicks on links, and downloads programs will benefit from an antivirus suite.
Our recommendations strike a balance between excellent protection, a worthwhile selection of features, and minimal impact on your PC’s performance. You can read about how we test antivirus suites below.
Updated 1/02/19 to include our review of Norton Security Premium (2019), which offers just minor revisions to the previous version but remains our top pick for AV nonetheless. Scroll to the end of the article to find links for all of our antivirus software reviews.
Best overall antivirus suite
Norton Security Premium still does an excellent job of protecting your PCs, doesn't bother you too much, and has a very easy-to-use interface. Norton protection doesn't come cheap, however, at $110 per year for up to 10 devices.
Norton Security Premium is an old name in security, but it has an easy-to-use interface, highly rated protection, and a number of helpful extra features. It’s on the higher end of the price spectrum at $110 per year (your first year is discounted to $55), but you can install it on up to 10 devices. (Read our full review.)
Best budget antivirus suite
AVG does an excellent job of protecting your PC. Its interface is not great, but for $70 you can protect all the Mac and Windows PCs in your household, as well as your Android devices.
AVG Internet Security does an excellent job of protecting your PC, but it’s interface could be a lot better. Nevertheless, with unlimited installs for $70 per year, it’s hard to beat this popular security solution. (Read our full review.)
Best antivirus suite for beginners
Trend Micro Maximum Security has an easily navigable interface, great protection, and the price is right. Some of its privacy features didn't work reliably in our tests, but the cloud protection scanning is an interesting feature, and Mute Mode is a great take on the usual gaming mode feature. Overall, Maximum Security is a good choice for antivirus on Windows.
Many antivirus suites create an interface that’s as simple as possible for users to understand—but sometimes the software becomes too stripped down. That’s why our recommendation for novices is Trend Micro Maximum Security.
This antivirus suite, which provides highly rated protection, strikes a nice balance between complexity and simplicity: Four category icons at the top let you dive deeper into the suite, but if all you need to do is a scan, that option is right there in the center of interface. You can’t miss it.
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Overall, no matter what you need to get done in Maximum Security, the interface doesn’t leave you with any guesswork.
What to look for in an antivirus suite
There are three basic requirements that an antivirus suite needs:
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That’s not all to consider, however. These days, many security suites come with extras such as a backup service for your most essential files, Android apps for mobile security, a more advanced firewall, family protection (read: child restriction) features, and the right to use the program on multiple PCs. Whether you need those extras depends on your personal situation.
How we test
First, we take a look at the interface to determine how easy or complicated it is. Does the interface make it easy to get at essential tools like PC scans and password managers, for example, or is everything buried under multiple clicks? Are there elements that look like they should be clickable but aren’t? Are alerts interactive or purely informational, and does that make sense in context?
The Mac line comes with a program called Migration Assistant, which makes it super easy to move data across your computers or even from a Time Machine backup.You can connect two devices using Thunderbolt, FireWire, Ethernet, or even just using the same Wi-Fi. Early in that process you’ll be offered the opportunity to transfer data from your old Mac to the new one via a wired Ethernet connection. This is your first glimpse of OS X’s Migration Assistant. On your new Mac: Open Migration Assistant, which is in the Utilities folder of your Applications folder. Click Continue. When asked how you want to transfer your information, select the option to transfer from a Mac, Time Machine backup, or startup disk. What is the program for transferring from old mac to new mac.
We also examine the features on offer. Every good antivirus suite should have the basics like scanning and real-time protection, but many vendors offer elements that go beyond basic security like password managers or firewalls. We try to discern whether any of these extra features are particularly useful, or just frills that look nice but don’t serve a practical purpose.
To test the suite’s demand on system resources, we run two benchmarks. The first is PCMark 8’s Work Conventional test, which simulates a variety of workloads including editing spreadsheets, browsing the web, and running video chat.
We run the benchmark before the security suite is installed. Then we install the software, have it run a full scan on our Windows 10 test machine, and start a second run of the benchmark at the same time. Then we compare the overall scores to see if the decline between the two benchmarks is significant.
As a harsher stress test, we also use Handbrake to transcode a video before and after installing the A/V. On most home PCs, this encoding task utilizes 100 percent of the CPU. We then compare transcoding times to see if there’s any significant decline.
Our test machine is an Acer Aspire E15 with an Intel Core i3-7100U, 4GB RAM, and a 1TB hard drive. Each security suite is tested on a clean install of Windows 10 Home.
As for the antivirus suite’s detection capabilities, we’ll rely on the opinions of security researchers dedicated to this task. We’ll take into consideration reports from outlets such as A-V Comparatives, A-V Test and SE Labs.
We’ll also take pricing into account and what you get for it.
Whenever possible we’ll review security suites using a free trial to get a sense of what consumers see when they first try out a new product.
Best antivirus: All of our reviews
Looking for a cheaper option or something with more flexibility? Or perhaps you just want to see what else is out there? Below is a list of all the antivirus suites we’ve reviewed. We’ll keep evaluating new ones and adding them here, so be sure to come back to see what else we’ve tested.
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If your email provider doesn't already filter spam at the source—most large commercial providers do—you'll benefit from having an anti-spam solution installed on your Mac. Several vendors offer a mix of paid and free software solutions that will help you tame the beast of unsolicited commercial email.
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![]() SpamSieve
SpamSieve lets you add superior Bayesian spam filtering to Mac OS X email clients. It's just as easy to use as Mail's junk-mail filters and can give you statistics, too.
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SpamSweep
SpamSweep successfully combines high-precision spam filtering with a simple and easy to use interface. It's a pity processing mail is a tad slow in SpamSweep, and a POP proxy mode would be nice.
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POPFile
POPFile is a powerful and flexible email classification POP and NNTP proxy that you can use to filter spam efficiently and categorize good mail automatically. However, POPFile can grow a bit heavy on memory and CPU load if you have trained on lots of mail.
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Spamfence
Spamfence is an effortless but highly effective spam and virus filtering service. Its only real shortcoming is that Spamfence relies on forwarding and requires two different email accounts.
Best Programs For Mac
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Spamfire
Spamfire combines efficient Bayesian filtering and ease-of-use to form a great anti-spam tool. It could integrate with email clients even better, though, and be a bit snappier overall.
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Paint Program For MacSpamato
Spamato filters POP and IMAP accounts for spam with the potential for high-precision and plug-ins that make it easy to use in Outlook and Mozilla Thunderbird. Unfortunately, Spamato can be a bit overwhelming with its multitude of options and little help.
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Personal Antispam X5
Personal Antispam X5 employs a number of tactics to rid Mac OS X Mail and Entourage of spam—a bit overeagerly, unfortunately.
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SpamBayes - Mac Spam Filter
SpamBayes employs sophisticated analysis using Bayesian statistics to rid your email Inbox of junk mail precisely and in an effortless manner.
Best Anti Malware For Mac
It would be great if SpamBayes' classifying power could be used to further categorize and prioritize good messages, and plug-ins for programs other than Outlook and Mozilla Thunderbird would be welcome.
Best Anti Ad Program For Macs
Anti-spam tools that run on your Mac can be good, but if you have the chance, use the anti-spam features offered by your email provider. Not only will server-based filtering prove less taxing to your computer's resources, but the anti-spam settings will persist when you check your email on a different computer.
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