I recently visited a customer with a "slow laptop". They had AVG, Avast, Norton and McAfee all installed at the same time! How that thing ever booted up is beyond me.

The best line “if your computer gets infected every time, there is a problem between the chair and the keyboard”. That is priceless. 😂

"You should not really trust any tier list...." Procedes to make tier list. Well played Sir. Well played.

I received a free ESET license from work, and it seems to be good so far, but the assisted learning mode sure causes a lot of popups. We use it in our office and it killed an attempted ransomware attack that had brute forced a domain admin password dead in its tracks, so I definitely rate it highly.

Glad to see other people calling out Norton and McAfee for the dumpster fires they are. It's insane how many people still don't realize just how bad those programs have gotten.

Removing Norton and McAfee completely without a trace from your computer tends to be harder than getting rid of some of the most troublesome viruses

I've been a pirate for more than a decade and ESET has never failed to protect me from dangerous sites.

As IT enthusiast for ~20 years (not working in business for 15 - now only fixing PCs / laptops for people on the side occasionally) - I completely agree with this list and all the tips and insights provided. Really great worth recommending video for people who maybe don't know much about this stuff. Funny how this popped up as suggestion on the side of watching astrophysics video :) Also internet with current OS versions is relatively safe space if you don't register and visit fishy websites and don't open attachments from unknown emails. The biggest risks for modern day user are data breaches and leaks on all the service websites hundreds of millions are using - like multiple google breaches, all sorts of social network data breeches, etc, where they leak your passwords and other data. Hell even leaking email address is bad thing because you land on spam lists which are also used by malware senders, scammers, and what not. And all this danger is not on client side nor out of his fault.

I can vouch the McAfee one. I once worked at a hospital that had them loaded everywhere and it turned i7 6th gen laptops to Celeron Ds.

Honestly, the info on why not to trust influencers who get kickbacks is more critical than the tier list.

Been using Malwarebytes for years and it detects a lot while their scans seem to be going strong too. I often use the manual scan of individual files through both Malwarebytes and Windows Antivirus.

I remember hearing a news story years ago about Kaspersky unearthing a highly secretive government intelligence operation because it's detection was soo thorough

Having worked in tech support, the words "the problem is between the chair and the keyboard" rang so true. Some people just don't know what they're doing and blindly click on anything. I have a hard time dealing with parents and in-laws who constantly find themselves with issues.

You forgot the most important security software: ad blockers Honestly, I only use AdBlock on Arch Linux and stay away from downloading suspicious files

I've personally seen Windows Defender completely ignore several viruses, while MalwareBytes has always caught them before they can do any damage. Sorry, but I do believe Defender is substandard at early detections when compared with MB.

hard to believe that ive used nothing but Kaspersky since 2007. I still remember when it was version 7. Part of the reason was because I managed to buy a tonne of leftover stock from a store that was going out of business and found a load of them still chilling at the back of the warehouse that had totally been forgotten. One of the greatest things about Kaspersky is keys from older versions will still activate for newer versions. There was a few years where they wouldnt allow this to happen but i think they rolled it back.

Working tech support back in the day, I distinctly remember commenting on how the Norton Suite trial would essentially start behaving like malware as soon as the trial period was over. Computers would display all the typical symptoms of being infected to the point that they seemed near unusable. Then, they would magically come back to life as soon as you uninstalled it. Really, the only worthwhile piece of software from Norton is their removal tool.

As a user of ESET for the last 8 years, having him nudge between A and S tier back and forth is a win for me

My experience back in the early 2000s, norton was dependable, but years later ended up being a nigtmare. It became so heavy, slowing down the pc a lot, and corrupting the os when you uninstall it.

Long time Trend user and have to say.. as long as they don't turn it off to access something that got a warning from trend.. have not had any systems get infected. And, once configured and folks told to click the do-not-show-again when offered the password manager.. it runs without dragging down the system and does the job without distraction. I like that it will give I think it's a weekly summary of trackers and bits it's blocked or dealt with for you and that's not too bad. I've usually been really happy it'd just dealt with things embedded in websites etc and didn't bother me about having to do so. Anyway, like the vid and your thoughts.. with my personal reservations re dumpstering Trend since I feel like they really are staying on-target and focused on their main business model.. Thanks for a good down to brass tacks video.. appreciate it.

I worked stint at McAfee. Didn't meet a single person there who would put it on their own system. The whole stack is a dumpster fire. This rating is 100% on point.

My school used McAfee back in the day (not sure when, possibly around 2005)... until one day it had a bug or false positive or something that ended up deleting the NETWORK DRIVER on all laptops in the entire school. These laptops were connected to the Windows domain and had remote management enabled, but of course without networking, a fix couldn't be easily deployed. The poor IT guy had to manually go around with a USB stick to fix each individual laptop, which was something like 400-500 units. They swore off McAfee ever since.

Thanks for the great video! I have one suggestion: if I understood correctly that your latest experience with the F-Secure one is from 2016, I'd recommend you give it another go in 2024 :) The detection rate (and the whole package) has developed quite a bit.

"It's a problem between the chair and the keyboard" best line!😂

Back when I used Windows, it was AVG, Avast, or Avira and Malwarebytes to weed out rootkits. Nowadays it looks pretty much the same, except the active antivirus now is Defender. Nice to see Malwarebytes is still useful for system scans.

Thanks for rating Windows defender and Malwarebytes. McAffee and Norton being reduced to bloat-ware is no surprise to anyone who isn't high on copium these days.

Thank you for your honesty, I'm usually very skeptical of this kind of videos but you seem kinda trust worthy, maybe because you made it easy for me heheh. Lately I've been cleaning my computer of crappy software that came with it and I wanted to know if I should install some antivirus for protection, but if the windows default one does its job so good, no need for extra protection I guess.

"but mcAfee and Norton are some of the oldest names in the industry" I remember when I was a kid I would ask my dad to turn on the old Windows Vista family computer before I home from school. So that by the time I got home Norton would _finally_ finish whatever it's doing in the background and I could finally get to playing club penguin or Poptropica or miniClip. I don't remember it ever being good.

As a Geek Squad Agent who has old people come in on a daily basis with Norton and McAfee, glad to know my feelings toward those two companies are valid. I’ve always told customers that Windows Defender is good enough and that Norton and McAfee are worse than actual viruses.

Finally, someone else sees McAfee and Norton for what they are. I thought I was alone. I've had them download viruses to my PC's when it was time to renew on both formats over the years. I built my first computer in 1996 and used McAfee, then my next in 2004-05 and used Norton. They worked well and gained my trust for years until probably mid 2010's.

Oh man, EVERY single thing I shop for and look up actual review articles for... ARE ALWAYS ADS for the top product, or the budget one that outdoes the higher priced things. It's literally every product, service, software, hardware, everything. ALL the "best of" articles are bought and paid for the brand that's most featured. And inevitably the one they want to sell you. Even amazon reviews are better than these things, or searching whatever I want then "reddit" and I get actual stories from customers about them.

I was given a brand-new laptop when I graduated and was getting ready to leave house. Norton came pre-installed and I hated it. A couple weeks after I had everything set up I started getting constant notifications that "my computer had viruses and I needed to pay 29.99 to clean it" and other crap, including my computer running very slowly and pop-up notifications *everywhere.* Notifications were awful. It would pop up at random intervals as long apart as 5 minutes or as short as immediately after I x'ed out the previous notification. They also wouldn't leave on their own, I would have to stop whatever I was doing just to clear the ad. Got fed up and spent an hour exterminating every bit of it from my computer with extreme predjudice. I wouldn't piss on Norton if it was on fire. I'd throw more gasoline.

I love that this is your honest opinion on this. There are so many shills out there, and when it comes to security, that is a bit of a scary thought...

Funny story time. My mom used to be absolutely terrified of not having a premium internet security suite. To be fair, the suite she used to have was one called Bullguard, which wasn't that bad. I've been telling her for literally years that she's wasting her money but parents are parents, and I've only been doing computer stuff for 20 years so what do I know? That very nice computer salesman at the shop suggested she use Bullguard and surely he knows what he's talking about! Anyway, Bullguard got bought out by Norton. Consequently the old Bullguard Internet Security got updated into Norton Internet Security. Which is absolute trash with dog vomit on top. Horrible UI, horrible performance, everything about it just plain old sucks. And it just will not stop nagging about additional premium nonsense that my mother very obviously does not need. That nag, and the fact that it could not be turned off, was finally enough to let me convince my mom to not keep paying for a premium internet security suite. So moral of the story, Norton Internet Security actually turned out very useful. I wouldn't have managed to convince my mom to save a bunch of money if NIS hadn't been quite that horrible.

I've been wanting to replace Norton for a while now, but I haven't gotten around to doing the research on what to swap to, so this is very helpful to me.

Eset wasn't able to stop ransomware was the time I changed to Bitdefender.

Windows Defender has worked great for me since windows 10. I haven't had any problems in years. I do run Malwarebytes to scan the system once in a while just to make sure nothing has slipped by. Remember Spybot Search & Destroy back in the day? LOL.

Another thing that has really rendered antivirus programs not quite as necessary nowadays is that the OSes themselves have been somewhat hardened over the years. Introduction of UAC for Windows, curated stores and package managers for installing software, hardened browsers, and more complete and timely auto updates have all gone a long way towards making antivirus software mostly obsolete.

Where are you on Spybot S&D? Back in the day I would use the immunization feature along with nod32, but is it worth doing that these days?

Im using Bitdefender Total Security on my workstation is that enough for me?

the most dangerous malware for a system is the user itself, always has been and always will be

I'm glad to see you acknowledged the PEBKAC error. Personally, though, I'm in the "Defernder is good enough" camp.

ive been using avast for a little bit (free version, im a bum) and i noticed where you put it in this list i know absolutely nothing about this field so just a few questions and observations: 1) for me avast tends to redirect me away from "infected" websites more often than windows defender, just wondering, in terms of pure avoidance of bad sites and dodgy installs (ignoring annoyance of use, data leaks, etc) how does it compare to defender? 2) is it worth just getting rid of it and relying on defender, is it going to be more or less as effective?

Being in IT for decades I remember back in the 90's where you could go to stores like Office Depot etc. and access a download station to get up to date antivirus... at that time Mc Affee was the state of the art solution, not only in detection but especially in removing annoying stuff like Shirley. Nowadays I avoid McA and Norton since they can be considered bloatware. So happy to see my personal experience reflected in your Tier list. Great video! Thanks and have another sub & like! Love&Peace Shen

The one thing I hate the most about Windows Defender is every time you update Windows or even just Defender itself gets updated, anything that I have put on the allow list is suddenly re-detected again, and I have to do it all over again. And often times, what I have allowed gets itself quarantined before I even realize it. It's just a pain in the ass. So anytime I have a client with Windows, who does a lot of things on the internet, the first thing I'll do is disable Windows Defender completely and install Webroot. It's been working well for me for five or six years now. Well, up until I switched to Linux. Now I don't run any antivirus.

Worth mentioning, Defender does have enterprise options for management/detection which can be handy if you're already invested in Microsoft's ecosystem (O326, Azure, SCCM, etc) called System Center Endpoint Protection.

I did a cybersecurity degree (in the US, fwiw) a couple of years ago and we put Windows Defender through its paces with a huge chunk of "mainstream" malware (no research, just for fun) and our results were on par with Chris' rating: pretty good. I personally don't use Windows as my main driver OS but have it there for some stuff and it was good to know that it was good enough for my use case (and maybe all use cases tbh). With that being said, I wish this video had some footnotes or at least verbal references that pointed to data that supported the tier list.

Regarding Lightweight and resource usage.Would it make sense to go with Avast or anything else for free over WinDef?

I started with Kaspersky back in the early days of Windows XP. I had been a Norton user but when I migrated to a 64-bit OS Norton, at that time, did not offer a 64-bit version. After doing my research Kaspersky was the best 64-bit app available at the time. I took note that it was a Russian company but... shoulder shrug. People I trusted reviewed it and gave it top marks. Kaspersky has served me very well over the years. It operates seamlessly and transparently in the background, and I have never once had any issues with it. I'll be staying with Kaspersky.

My personal experience, Eset is the best. It's the only one I've seen catching a lot BEFORE it infects the system. It works really well with stopping just about anything at the browser. I never worry about the scans because it just catches it before it gets there.

imagine paying for antivirus

The question with so-called "antivirus software" is not how good they are, but how useless or even dangerous and destructive they are.

I've been using Eset for almost a decade now, I think it was smart security 6 when I first got it. Not the best detection but very light, only recently I find it a little heavy perhaps because I've been working with more flash drives and other removable storage. Probably a reason why I have not used others since is because of my configurations to the software, tricky to setup but I believe it's worth the time. Great video!

Bitdefender does have central management (Bitdefender Central) So I have to question how you put Webroot (which you said had worse detection rates) above the others based on easier management.

McAfee just spams emails after u cancel too

Are these picks for Windows OS only or for all platforms like iOS, OS X, Android OS, and Linux distros? Thanks!

I can tell my experience with Malwarebytes, it saved my 2 computers from malwares multiple times when i was a little boy clicking on ... questionable download buttons to play some older games... but i can definitely say one thing, once you know exactly what you're doing on the web, you don't really need an antivirus; altough i like to keep malwarebytes sleeping in the background until once a year i wake it up to make a system scan, that usually gives nothing out, just gotta be careful out there XD

Good to see ESET is still on the top. I'm currently using it on my PC actually.

I used TotalAV for a while. Wondering if you have any thoughts on that one?

Does this apply only for windows or for other OSs too?

I like your honesty. I'm just not 100% sold on your list, nor the reasoning behind some of the reasons. Especially the placing of WebRoot.

As you mentioned, the ID10T behind the keyboard clicking on links is our main problem. And that's with them only having User access accounts. I'd hate to see how bad it would be if they had admin rights which some businesses have done.

I thought you were joking about Webroot but you kept talking without laughing.

Love the vid, any thoughts on a business/small enterprise antivirus software called crowdstrike?

I like how he just lay it out there in the end, "The problem is YOU." because it's so true. We as the user wouldn't even be infected in the first place if we really becareful in what we do. We're getting attacked from many ways now like through e-mails, calls, sms, etc. These kind of attack usually uses a method that will panic users like involving bank account, fines or tickets, and personal accounts issues. We need to always calm down, read everything properly, and always check whom and where was it sent from. Stay safe!

I'm a long time Kaspersky user and I think sometimes it doesn't get the recognition it deserves, it can be annoying sometimes as it detects even the slightest aware attempt, but at the same time it works great and doesn't slow down the computer

I used to use a antivirus a lot but not anymore. I feel confident on my computer skills and I have a great sense of security. From time to time I download an antivirus (usually Malwarebytes) to do a full scan just in case I missed something and uninstall it just after the scan.

My main problem with the one intergrated in windows is how many false positives it has. I constantly have to add exceptions for directories into list because it is trying to prevent me from running because it thinks they have viruses.

Having a similar IT history as you I am surprised / not surprised my ranking is basically yours to a tee. Great advice and breakdowns across the board

Webroot being "S-Tier" with the lower detection rates and the exploit is a joke

I used Norton back in the day, on an old laptop with a core duo and 1 gig if ram. It made it run so slowly that the computer would crash if you did so much as open three tabs in Firefox

My PC came with McAfee installed and it annoyed me because it's super annoying to uninstall.

I find Kaspersky amazing if you are into piracy. The detection ratio like you said is S tier, but also I hardly had any false positives with it. It does a really good job.

"It's the problem between the chair and the keyboard" - Wisest sentence ever spoken on cybersec domain for a user

The US Military (specifically the Navy, where I have experience) uses Mcafee. It's a massive pain in the butt to work around.

Intersting video Chis, thanks. I'm curious if you have not already done so.. whats the best home made free suite for total protection? Ie; free antivirus and add a ..? what would that be?

This video was great! I would love to see a tier list just like this for VPNs, because that industry feels very similar.

The best Antivirus : Common Senses

Well thats my views also, and nice to see an honest review. Once upon a time AVG was the one to install at home but since MS took security seriously with defender I've never bothered with 3rd party ones. On linux I need to install AV for clients, however I am dictated to by the windows mindset and software. Recently we have been installing MDE on all systems so I guess in summary stick with MS since they do not want their reputation trashed and have been trying really hard to turn around their image from the XP days, where your machine would be infected before you had even logged in lol.

Used to have a Norton suite and moved away from them after your video. Using Windows Defender now and I periodically use antivirus launchers from a USB stick I created to do full scans. No issues so far. Others individual results may vary. Great video.

Been in IT since 96. I agree. I use Webroot for my customers because its a good AV, has good management (does what I tell it), isn't chatty, & is VERY INEXPENSIVE but with about 230 computers on it I see about 1-2 viruses caught per year (worth having just for that). I also agree Sophos has slightly better detection but its far more expensive. For business use, most others aren't even options to me

From the antiviruses listed here, ESET is the one that gave me the best results and I do like to have it as a suit, I own a multidevice licence for ESET Internet Security which includes not only the antivirus "engine" but also a personal firewall which is quite useful being used in the interactive mode so you can have almost complete control about which apps communicate through internet without having to manualy set a bunch of rules on beforehand.

it took me YEARS to persuade my parents to get rid of Norton. their PC was a sloth, a tortoise, and they always complained about it. I kept saying get rid of that useless software but they couldn't let go of the belief that it was protecting them and nothing else would do the job as well, because thats what the guy who sold them the computer said.

Hi, I wonder what your thoughts are on Emsisoft?

I've been using ESET (NOD32) AV for over 15 years and it has never let me down. I do agree it has gotten a little heavier since the early NOD32 days but there is nothing that would make me switch to anything else at this time.

When I was a kid, our computer would come down with a viral flu every so often. Doesn't happen these days, even though I use internet a whole lot more

I remember having to fight tooth and nail with Norton during college, when its reputation service would flag the small little "Hello world" esque application that I had JUST COMPILED locally as "unsafe" because "very few" people had used it. So many exceptions for various a.exe paths from the code samples in my textbook...

What I dislike about antivirus software is how they often hide or bundle their installation with another application's installer. The abundance of adware (though I'm not sure with this one) and unnecessary and constant notifications that come with them can be quite annoying. The last time I had an antivirus was probably eight years ago when I was more innocent about these things.

I had Norton for me and my dad as kind of a safety net. But every year it was the same scheme: suddenly my subscription was renewed for about a 100€ and only me haggling with their customer support would get me down to the usual 30€ / year. And I got tired of it.

We were stuck with McAffe on our PCs at work. People complained so much about it that the IT guys finally removed it last year.

Have not used or looked at my AV for the past 10+ years; only have Defender. I worked in IT security, I am no expert but smart enough to avoid threats or use sketchy stuff on a separate or virtual machine

I have ESET Antivirus, never had an issue with its detection/background operation. I've also NEVER used free antivirus software because most have malware for advertisements in the background which opens up a different line of safety which is ironic considering the software it's being used through.

Having been a longtime Avast user because this was from the Vista era of computers, I'm not at all surprised to see it fall from grace, but all things considered I can't tell if having it on my current laptop is strictly because of old muscle memory clouding my judgement. At least Malwarebytes is still getting good reps, which is nice, had to use that quite a bit to clean out my computers back in the day.

so about mcafee , is it really that bad and should i go with kasperski or stick with the defender?

The process for creating a tier list of antivirus software involves community voting to rank the software based on their effectiveness. This tier list helps in identifying the best antivirus software options at the top of the list and the least effective ones at the bottom. By referring to the tier list, users can easily choose a reliable antivirus software that offers strong protection against malware and other threats, thus addressing potential security problems at different stages.

I like Kaspersky as even though it's kind of annoying, it has actually worked perfectly for me, and my PC has never got infected. Kaspersky's scan for external devices and downloads is very good. Also Kaspersky probably has the least false positive rates, I have rarely had actual software treated as a malware. It also has a seperate category for "Legitimate Software that can be used by criminals" which is pretty good as it's just a warning for the user.

I used to work for Bitdefender and I have been working in the IT industry for the past 18 years, and I would move e-set to B, Kaspersky to S and for regular users (not business) Webroot to B, but the rest are 100% accurate from my personal experience also. I personally do not use any antivirus and I have even intentionally disabled my Windows Defender as well. As you stated, no antivirus is going to protect and the real problem is YOU (THE USER) ! P.S. Bitdefender has a good business model but I also prefer Webroot for the business side. I wish you a lot of less hate Chris, this video is cool, I approve!

Finally a video i can share with some actually good advice about security and antiviruses to save time explaining these things, i'm sick and tired of uninstalling mcafee (or any of it's standalone components) from so many computers at this point, my general advice is 99% of the time adblock and up-to-date defender is all you need if you don't do anything shady

computer shops never have those "Ok but don't buy it" and "You be better off..." , I think their already update and reminded , it might cause bad business to them if they sell those.

I like Eset or Kaspersky because I can easily disable them for a few minutes or one hour to speed up backups on external drives or avoiding false negative when writing Linux ISOs with Rufus. They are also lighter than Defender.