Which of the free antivirus softwares is the best?

Antivirus (or anti-virus) is a type of software used to prevent, detect, and remove any type of malware, including virus, trojan horses, worms, spyware, adware, dialers, keyloggers and rootkit infections. There are many antivirus software products that can be downloaded and used for free.

In many cases, free antivirus can offer more or less the same protection as a paid product. Combined with firewall, it provides sufficient security for whatever kind of user.

It is not easy to say clearly which antivirus software is the best of all. The comparison we provide here is extracted from multiple internet resources (forums, blogs), computer magazines and our own experience. Presented results are partly subjective, it is not possible to decide objectively which layout is better and which is worse.

So, here is the final chart:
 1. Avira AntiVir Personal Edition offers an excellent protection from viruses, spywares and rootkit threats. It is very light on the resources and works hard in detecting any malware in your system. Some actually say that this is better than almost every other free antivirus program. However, Avira AntiVir does not have web or e-mail scanning capabilities. This feature is only available in the full version, which you have to pay to get. But don’t start looking away yet because the lack of e-mail scanning capability of this software only means it will not warn you beforehand in opening an infected e-mail. If you do open one, the software starts going ballistic over this malware and warns you about it. From there, you can choose what to do with the options offered.
Official Page: http://www.avira.com/en/avira-free-antivirus

 2. Avast! Free Antivirus is also one of the better known software today. The virus detection rate is equal with Avira AntiVir. This free antivirus has many, if not the most, features with real-time capabilities including IM, web, e-mail, P2P and network shields, boot-time scanning and behavioral blocker. Like Avira AntiVir, it is also light on the memory.
Official Page: http://www.avast.com/index

 3. AVG Antivirus Free Edition is also among the most popular of its genre. It’s widely used by the public due to its good detection rate. However, in recent times, many analysts say that in some way, this software has been left out by the others due to its slow scan speeds. It has also become significantly huge using a large part of the system’s resources.
Official Page:  http://free.avg.com/ww-en/homepage

 4. Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) has outstanding detection rates, especially for rootkits. It is highly regarded for its accuracy and little false positive detection. It is also excellent in removing any existing malware and occupies a small portion of the memory. It is user-friendly and highly suitable for beginner to average users. With minimal user interaction, automatic updates and removal of threats, there’s no need for the user to do things manually with this software. Like AVG, Microsoft Security Essentials has slow scan speed and takes a long time to quarantine a malware. Also, a genuine copy of Windows is necessary for MSE to be installed due to the validation needed for the operating system (OS).
Official Page: http://www.microsoft.com/en-ca/security_essentials/default.aspx

 5. PC Tools AntiVirus Free Edition provides good protection against worms, spywares and viruses like Trojan. It updates the software rapidly and features an IntelliGuard real-time technology. It also has Email Guard to check and scan your e-mails. It deserves a special mention because it was created by the makers of the award-winning Spyware Doctor.
Official Page: http://www.pctools.com/free-antivirus/






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