Microsoft Security Essentials vs Avira vs avast! vs AVG: Best free anti-virus/anti-malware program for Windows [3rd Edition]
December 18, 2011 402
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Without a doubt one of the most popular questions I am asked is “which security software should I use for my computer?” Often times the person asking me the question is looking for a free security solution as opposed to a paid one. To address this question, I have already created a post on best security software. However, now – in this article – I am going to directly address the issue of “should I use Avira, avast!, or AVG?” Of course there are many other free anti-virus/anti-malware software. However, I feel these three are the most popular and most commonly inquired about, hence why I picked them.
Update on December 3, 2010: Because of its growing popularity, and requests made to me by many people, Microsoft Security Essentials is now included in this comparison.
When evaluating security software and trying to decide which one you want to use, there are two main areas which you should look at: Features and performance. So, lets get started.
This review is part of our Best Free Windows Software section. Check out more articles on the best free Windows programs from here.
Table of Contents
Summary of Update
Features Comparison
Performance Comparison
Detection Rates
Malware Removal Effectiveness
Computer Impact
In the 3rd edition of dotTech’s guide on Best Free Windows Anti-Virus/Anti-Malware the following changes have been made:
- Features Comparisonsection has been updated to reflect new features added to Avira Free, avast! Free, AVG Free, and Microsoft Security Essentials since the 2nd edition of this article was written. All four made tweaks and modifications to their existing features; the major new features are:
- Avira Free – “WebGuard”
- avast! Free – Behavior blocker, “Auto Sandbox”, “Script Shield”, “WebRep”
- AVG Free – Largely unchanged
- Microsoft Security Essentials – Behavior blocker, “Network Inspection System”
- Performance Comparison section has been updated to reflect new on-demand and retrospective detection rates for Avira Free, avast! Free, and Microsoft Security Essentials. AVG Free did not participate in the latest retrospective tests so AVG Free’s detection rates have been updated only for on-demand tests.
- Performance Comparison’s sub-section Speed and Computer Usage has been rewritten with a new source and renamed to Computer Impact.
- Performance Comparison now includes a new sub-section, Malware Removal Effectiveness.
(Click on the chart to view it in full size.)
In terms of features, as you can see in the chart above, all four programs provide the necessary fundamental protection. However, it is worth noting that neither of the programs provide full/advanced phishing protection; you will have to cough up money for paid versions to get full/advanced phishing protection. Or, you could just be careful about what links you click; and double-check to make sure the website you are at is who it claims to be since phishing success heavily depends on social engineering and user ambivalence.
Furthermore, while all four programs provide the fundamentals, avast! is the most notable one for going “above and beyond” the basics and providing a little extra bang for the buck (or lack thereof). In other words, avast! provides more “extra” features than the other three, although AVG Free also has some nice extras. It also should be noted Avira Free’s “WebGuard” requires users to install Avira Toolbar, which is powered by Ask.com; and Microsoft Security Essentials has an interesting feature called “Network Inspection System” — a guard against network-based exploits.
Lastly, even though Microsoft Security Essentials is the only one to not prompt users with advertisements it must be noted that the ads in avast! Free are non-intrusive and embedded within the main console window – they are not the popup ads Avira Free is notorious for and AVG Free sometimes displays.
(Click on the chart to view it in full size.)
(Click on the chart to view it in full size.)
When viewing the above test results, keep a few things in mind:
- The On-Demand Anti-Malware Tests are tests done on the security software with all their features enabled (with all settings set to the highest possible). The Retrospective/Proactive Anti-Malware Tests are tests done specifically on the security softwares’ heuristics capabilities; their capabilities to protect against unknown/new malware that have no signatures. It needs to be mentioned that heuristics is not the only feature that security software use against unknown/new malware. Other feature, such as behavior blocking, also help detect unknown/new malware; however only the heuristics feature (and no other features, such as behavior blocking) was tested in the Retrospective/Proactive Anti-Malware Tests.
- For the The On-Demand Anti-Malware Tests
- Microsoft Security Essentials had “very few” false positives; Avira had “few” false positives; avast! had “few” false positives; and AVG had “many” false positives.
- Avira scanned at “fast” speed; avast! scanned at “fast” speed; AVG scanned at “average” speed; and Microsoft Security Essentials scanned at “slow” speed.
- The tests were conducted 1-5 months ago. In other words, Avira, avast!, AVG, and MSE (Microsoft Security Essentials) may have improved (or degraded) their performance since these tests were conducted. These are the versions of each program used for both of the above tests:
- The tests were conducted using the free version of Avira (“Avira AntiVir Personal” is another name for Avira Free); free and paid version of AVG, respectively for each test; and free version of avast!. Microsoft Security Essentials, of course, is free by definition.
Because of the above mentioned points,
- The performance of each software today may be different than when the tests were conducted.
- The performance of the free edition AVG may perform slightly differ than what is shown above since paid version for AVG was used for one test.
However, keeping that in mind, for the purposes of a simple comparison these test results work just fine because they give general indications, which is what we are looking for.
That being said, the results are a clear indication of Avira’s detection superiority. Not only does Avira have the highest on-demand detection rates, but it also tops the chart for retrospective tests; all with fast scanning and few false positives. avast! comes in a close second with healthy on-demand and retrospective rates, fast scanning, and few false positives. MSE is fourth in on-demand detection but does very well in retrospective tests and comes out on top when it comes to false positives. (It should be noted MSE’s lower on-demand rates help it do better in terms of false positives: It detects less so there is less chance of it to have false positives.) AVG, in my opinion, is the most disappointing of the lot. It doesn’t do too badly in on-demand but does terrible for retrospective and has many false positives.
Based off just these test results, Avira and avast! are definitely my two top picks, with MSE a close third. However, the tests were conducted in a lab setting for benchmark purposes. In other words, they don’t exactly reflect “real life”. In real-life usage the protection between all four program will be similar because most user activity will fall within areas covered by all four. I may be a bit bold when I say this but the differences between all four software will typically only be felt when conducting benchmarks or tests.
(Click on the chart to view it in full size.)
Being able to detect malware has value in of itself; simply knowing you are infected is worthwhile. However, an anti-virus/anti-malware program that cannot remove malware is probably one you don’t want to have. Hence in the 3rd edition of dotTech’s guide on Best Free Windows Anti-Virus/Anti-Malware we look at the results of a malware removal effectiveness test.
Before we discuss the results it must be noted this malware removal effectiveness test had limited scope — it only used ten samples. It is hard, and frankly not fair or logical, to draw authoritative conclusions based on a test that only used ten samples. However, for the purposes of a non-authoritative indicator, this test will do just fine… as long as you keep in mind the limited scope.
That said, Avira once again tops the charts. MSE comes in a close second with AVG and avast! lagging as distant third and fourth, respectively. As I said, this test used only ten samples so we can’t say avast! or AVG are incompetent at removing malware while Avira or MSE are the best. The results very well could have been different if different ten malware samples were picked. (That is why having a large, randomized sample size is important in any test.) However, I believe it is fair to say with its combined stellar performance on-demand and retrospective detection rates and malware removal effectiveness, Avira more than makes up in performance what it lacks in features.
(Click on the chart to view it in full size.)
(Click on the chart to view it in full size.)
(Click on the chart to view it in full size.)
NOTE: Avira Free 2012, avast! Free v6, AVG AntiVirus 2012, and Microsoft Security Essentials v2.1 were used for the above tests.
Generally speaking, the computer impact of all four software is about the same. True, avast! does come out on top but only by a small margin; and this small margin will only be noticed when benchmarking — not in real-life usage. Really the only test worth noting is opening Word and opening PDF. In this test avast! out shines the other three on the first run (subsequent run they all perform the same). All other aspects of the Computer Impact test end up with results that are too close to draw lines between.
(For those that don’t know, PC Mark is a professional, industry-recognized benchmarking tool. The higher PC Mark score, the better. However, when it comes to PC Mark, few points here and there have no significant meaning. If PC Mark scores were drastically different, such as 50 or more, then it would be worth looking at.)
Note: All tests referenced in all Performance Comparison sub-sections of this article were not conducted by dotTech. They (the tests) were conducted by AV-Comparatives.org, an authority on security software testing. I attained permission to re-publish AV-Comparatives’ results on dotTech when I originally wrote this article.
While there are some noteworthy aspects – such as Microsoft Security Essential’s low false positive count or avast!’s lowest computer impact or Avira’s best detection and removal performance – there is no one “winner” between Microsoft Security Essentials, Avira Free, avast! Free, and AVG Free. To try to determine which one is the “best” is like trying to split hairs; it is hard to do and it hurts. In real-life situations, all four programs will provide users with excellent protection.
However, with that being said, if I were to rank these four I would rank Avira and avast! as my top two picks; Avira for its detection and malware removal and avast! for its features and lowest computer impact. Microsoft Security Essentials and AVG come after Avira and avast!, with each providing one or two unique features that have potential to win over users.
Now, what program you should use comes down to your specific needs and desires. Want the most features? avast! Free is the way to go. Are you looking for the best detection rates and don’t care about anything else? Avira Free is for you. Want a simple anti-malware program that provides great protection without nagging ads? Microsoft Security Essentials beckons you. Worried about network security? Microsoft Security Essentials’ “Network Inspection System” may serve you well. Are you a social network addict? Go with AVG Free for it has “Social Network Protection”. Hate false positives? Avoid AVG and consider Microsoft Security Essentials. Dislike slow scan times? Don’t get Microsoft Security Essentials. Surf the web a lot, besides your frequent websites? avast! Free’s “Web Shield” provides better specialized protection in that area than the other three programs. Download lots of software? avast! Free’s “Auto Sandbox” may be your next best friend.
I have provided you with the facts; now the choice of Microsoft Security Essentials, Avira Free, avast! Free, or AVG free is in your hands. Whichever one you pick, rest assured all four will serve you well.
Avira Free AntiVirus
Supported OS: Windows 2000+
Avira AntiVir Personal homepage [download link]
avast! Free Antivirus
Supported OS: Windows XP+
avast! Free Antivirus homepage [download link]
AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition
Supported OS: Windows 2000+
AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition homepage [download link]
Microsoft Security Essentials
Supported OS: Windows XP and higher
Microsoft Security Essentials homepage
Originally written on February 14, 2010. 2nd edition posted on December 3, 2010. 3rd edition posted on December 18, 2011.
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I have used each one of them at some point …
i used Avg for years .. however I’ve always had problems updating it … and after some research I found that a lot of other users have that problem too.
so I decided to give Avira a shot … it was nice however it did give a lot of false positives and the updates were a problem too.
basically because both updates of Avira and Avg are relatively large for my slow internet connection : so the update download always breaks.
so finally I decided to use avast the interface bugged me at first but the extra features and the small size of signature updates made it the keeper :)
@Samuel: It actually happens very frequently… it’s annoying, but by no means a deal breaker. It does that if it’s been running while on a carpet, or if its 1GB graphics card is under heavy load. (Once, I was playing a game, Age of Empires 3 if you must know, and I had to stand the laptop on its side-the vent is maybe 1/2 under the laptop- and use a fan to cool it off. Luckily I have an external monitor I can use if needed.)
@Locutus: What are you running with MSE? I am thinking to give the combo of MSE + avast! a go.
@Ashraf: Nothing, really. It is after all an antivirus, not an antispyware, program (although it has antispyware.)
@Locutus: Valid point. Hopefully by next week I plan on conducting my own MSE tests and will post about them.
Thanks Ashraf for this comprehensive review. This is mostly asked question and your review is simply superb.
I have always used Avira and has never let me down. I have always recommended my friends to use Avira. So my personal favorite and recommended FREE antivirus is AVIRA.
THANKS ASHRAF.
The false positives in Avira were driving me nuts until I Googled it and found out how to dig in to the program and set exceptions! Absolutely NO problem since!
Never ever had any any virus through email yet, but I suppose that is a potential weakness.
What do you think about that?
@Harry:
Set Antivir to detect on read and write and you won’t have problems with Email virus. Actually Antivir doesn’t advertise an Email protection because the free edition won’t scan your mail during download (Premium does) but in fact,if you open infected mail, it reacts instantly.
Thanks for the feedback. My AVG expires soon, so I’ll replace it with one of the “freebies”! Now just to decide which one to use. Of course with Ashraf’s fabulous review and all the comments from users, I may just flip a coin!
You are the greatest!
1) I ran Avira for quite a while in conjunction with Comodo Internet Security Suite.
2) I grew weary of Comodo’s clunking inability to learn properly — in my particular experience, it was the most amnesiac “defender” ever encountered. (Which is not to say that’s anyone else’s experience.)
3) I switched to Online Armor from the Australian developer, Tall Emu. In practice and in presentation it has proved consistently superior to Comodo. Latterly I’ve paid for the upgrade to the commercial version on one machine; another is now running Online Armor PRo as a freebie (thanks to the tip-off here on dot.tech.)
4) I teamed Online Armor with Avira but, oh ye gods, Avira’s continual update problems became just too darn much to contend with. Don’t take my word for it. Ask the many thousands of former users worldwide. Avira’s explanations were tardy, inadequate, and in some cases, plain daft (if your auto update fails, and your attempt at a manual update fails, then please download the entire signatures library as that will be up to date.) Oh. Really.
5) I tried AVG but briefly, as much for a trip down memory lane as anything else. (I suppose I could’ve done the same with ZoneAlarm.) AVG managed, in its short life span this time around, to flag three false positives and miss one actual. (The actual was picked up by the excellent Prevx 3.0 scanner, which for some reason rarely if ever gets mentioned here.)
6) And so to Avast. No, I didn’t particularly mind Avira’s bloody terrible nag screens every time it auto-updated though yes, I certainly did resent them when all I got was the nag but not the update. But Avast has no nag screen. So that’s one up to Avast.
7) Using Avira and Comodo in their last working combination I was hit twice in succession by attempted interventions from Winsecurity scumware. Neither Avira nor Comodo intercepted them.
8) Couple days back, I was — or would’ve been — hit with another scumware attempted invasion. Avast blocked it immediately. Two up to Avast.
9) Avast’s scanning has — to me — never taken that much longer than Avira’s used to do but in any event, why does elapsed time mean anything? I am perfectly able to keep on working on my computer during a scan. And candidly: if a scan’s ultra quick, then I’m actually not that comfortable.
(Caveat: neither slowness nor rapidity should ever be taken as absolute guides though. I recently ran a Panda scan and it took three times longer to complete than Prevx 3.0. Panda found nothing. Prevx did — nothing serious, but enough to warrant investigation.)
10) I wouldn’t use another iObit product if you paid me. Trusting a company’s software to do what it says it’s doing when it is wholly impossible to trust the company about what it says it’s doing makes not the slightest scrap of sense for any computer user. (And iObit 360 Security, now in its, ahem, revised guise, is no better and, very likely, a lot worse than SUPER antispyware or the venerable Malwarebytes.)
Finally. . .
Avast right now is in even newer form than ever before and as fighting fit as ever.
I’ve not encountered a single auto update failure, nor a single nag screen, nor a single defence hiccough. User stats for Avast worldwide are growing. The reason’s not difficult to see.
For me, then, no contest: Avast (and, of course, Online Armor) though of course, no other AV should be running if the user has Online Armor Premium.
Thanks for the great over-view, Ashraf: as usual, well done.
@Betty: I really recommend Microsoft Security Essentials! It seems fast to me… but that may just be Windows 7 :D
@Locutus: It is fast, but it’s protection isn’t the greatest. Even MS admits it but their idea was that somethings better than nothing.
Ok, here’s some stats on Microsoft Security Essentials:
-Scan: Windows folder (12GB) and 32-but Program Files folder (600MB)
–Time: 30 minutes
—This is after a fresh restart, where Firefox was just being opened and services just starting
-Memory usage:
–User Interface: 4MB
–Program:
—Not scanning: 45MB
—Scanning: 60MB
Also, you can easily use your computer with no lag while it is scanning.
I might make a comparison table later, but I don’t really want to pollute my Windows install.
I’m an Avira fan. I tried Avast and AVG too, but their main problem is that their on access scanning engine won’t let me ignore a virus detection (i.e. they force me to move to quarantine, block or delete, and in some cases I really need the option to ignore the warning and continue). Of course I could add the folder/file to the exception lists, but I find that too annoying. As for detection rates, Avira has a pretty good detection rate, but it still missed some infected files.
Personally, i use Avira. I used to use AVG, but the only thing it would ever detect are cookies. Since then, i got a new laptop and installed all of the protection programs you suggested ashraf, and since then have had no problems, and I enjoy giving installers permissions in half a dozen programs if it wants to change something.
In my case, I use the paid version of Malwarebytes and Eset NOD 32 on all my machines and those of a friend’s. For anyone requesting a free solution, I tend to recommend avast! Free and Malwarebytes Free. All that said, the reports on Microsft Security Essentials are very favorable and may change the free approach in the future.
I’ve been using Avira for maybe a year, and I used somebody’s tip (Ashraf’s? Raymond’s?) to make the nag screens disappear from view.
My main beef is that the updates slow my old-ish computer (Thinkpad T40, 1GB, XP SP2) to a crawl (or slower). Whenever my computer becomes snail-like and unresponsive, I can usually count on seeing the little pop-up that says that Avira has just downloaded God-knows-how-many update files.
If this happened once a week it would be a minor nuisance, but it seems to happen a couple of times a day! Since I’ve had exactly ONE actual encounter with a live virus in decades of active computing (the quite ugly NIMDA worm!), I don’t think the threat is really worth the nuisance, even without the nag screens!
P.S. I’m running a full Avira system scan now, and it’s apparently my first one since last MAY!! I guess I’ve been relying a bit much on the real-time “Guard”. . .
I have been using Avira for last one year. Earlier I couldn’t stick to any antivirus for long and would often change it. Avira has the best detection rates, as a result the other on-demand scanners including reputed online scans don’t find any serious infections on my system apart from spy cookies.
Regarding false positives, these are from huge and varied database. Normally, most home users shouldn’t be affected. The other thing is that an antivirus with slightly low false positives could affect u more than an antivirus with slightly more FPs. It all depends on what files they find on ur system because all antiviruses have difft. set of FPs.
At least in my case Avira has not bothered me with any genuine files stating them to be infections.Besides Fps dont bother me much because
I dont want to live with a trojan installed on my system while I am totally unaware of when and how it got installed and worse I dont even know that it is there because my antivirus with low Fps and with added set of features which may not be actually required failed to detect the infection which was its primary task. While I only worry about some files on my system which I know r only FPs. That position is not acceptable. The antivirus should focus on keeping my system clean and not on being fancy with variety of features which only look good on face. But that is my personal view point.
So I strongly recommend avira unless the company decides to reduce the strength of free version in future.
@normofthenorth: It was Ashraf’s tip :D Also, as I’ve said in previous comments, I recommend MSE. Give it a try!
i’m used to like avira because of their best detecting malware even though there are many false positive, but recently when avast release their new avast 5 free antivirus, i just got attracted with their new interface and all the extra features that were provided. but now, i think avira might be the best antivirus because we suppose to care about the best security for our computer not the features or the interface that matter
Why I don’t use AVG and will never use AVG again!
I originally used InoculateIT (back when) until it was taken over and converted to a commercial AV. It was the best and I think the only Free AV at that time. It was an excellent program.
I searched for another one and found AVG and used it for about a year. I thought it was a good program but eventually found out it wasn’t. I ended up getting a virus. It was an old one, and very annoying (nothing serious.) I had gotten itthrough downloading a highly recommended Free Web Design program. (Which eventually was found to contain that virus)
Anyway back to why I don’t use AVG. I knew I had a virus, but AVG never found it. I finally did an online scan which discovered the virus.
I sent an email to AVG informing them of the virus and that their free AV hadn’t found it and my disappointment in their product. Their response is my reason for never wanting to use AVG again.
I was informed that the virus I had was an old one that they hadn’t bothered to put definitions for in their program because it was an old one, and they didn’t really care. They informed me if I wanted better protection I should buy their Pro version. I informed them that since they didn’t care because I was using the free version why should I buy their pro version.
I searched the ‘net and eventually found Avast and haven’t looked back since. I have tried other free AV’s, including Avira, but I always go back to Avast!
39 MikeR
If you use OnlineArmor++ you don’t need an additional AV program !
There should be a poll in this thread.
I am using all of them on different PCS, so that I double check some files transferred between them.
AVG was my free choice back in 2008.
Avira was the king in 2009 (although updates had severe problematic time periods).
The new improved Avast is my choice by far for 2010!
Just too many extra features to ignore, given for free!
I strongly suggest anyone to give it a try, but be warned: you will not come back!
I have also tried most paid programs and my favorite had been NOD32.
Just a hint for notebook users:
AVG, by default, scans the hard disk in the background and reports out of the blue the infections. This may be nice for new users, but not necessary for many others.
It drains the battery and uses more resources all the time.
I prefer the scan on access style.
Panda is the worst paid version because it also scans in the background but DOES NOT give the user the option to choose what to do with the infections!
Automatically deletes them for the sake of security!
Amazing drawback and I just couldn’t believe, after a lot of search, that there was no option to change this…
Online Armor is a VERY interesting and strong software, which CAN be used together with the classic antivirus softz. It may not be suggested in terms of resources and compatibility to have 2 antiviruses together but it was initially designed to be working along with others! Designed so, before antivirus was introduced to the premium version. (I use the premium successfully with Avast and Avira on a couple of computers).
So, its a great add-on for PCs you may want extra security. :-)
I am not commenting on experiences from other add-on security suites as it will be off topic.
Except this!:
IOBit security 360 (and all their products), for many reasons except the fiasco with malwarebytes (mostly because of suspicious control behavior), were uninstalled from ALL computers!
Pity cause I liked the nice and background working defrag tool… but what the heck, there are safer options.
have been using avira with online armor (free) and threatfire and prevx (in free ‘detection only’ mode). have never gotten a false positive from these.
very happy with this set up.
also run free spyware doctor (from google pack) on demand only, and free malwarebytes’ on demand
use firefox with no script. all my stuff is free, works great. i see no need to pay for security products
@jumbi: Ashraf did have that Poll on AV software a while back.