Antiviruses for Windows

The main evaluation criteria, which included 200 indicators, were:

• virus protection;
• Ease of use;
• influence on the speed of the computer.

Protection against malware is the most important evaluation criterion: indicators within this group of parameters accounted for 65% of the overall antivirus rating. Ease of use and impact on computer speed accounted for 25% and 10% of the overall score, respectively.

Antivirus programs were selected for research based on popularity among consumers and affordability. For this reason, the list of antivirus programs studied included:

• Free programs – both built-in and offered separately.
• Paid programs from leading antivirus brands. Based on selection principles, the study did not include the most expensive versions of software products from these brands.
• Only one paid product from one brand for one operating system could be included in the rating. The second product could only be included in the rating if it was free.

This time, the international study included products developed by Russian companies in the category. As a rule, the list of products for international testing includes products with a sufficient market share and high recognition among consumers, so the inclusion of Russian developments in the study indicates their wide representation and demand abroad.

Top Ten for Windows

All antiviruses in the top ten cope with spyware protection and protect against phishing - attempts to gain access to confidential data. But there are differences between antiviruses in the level of protection, as well as in the presence or absence of this or that function in the tested versions of the antivirus.

The summary table shows the top ten programs according to the overall rating. It also takes into account the features of the packages in terms of their set of functions.

How good is standard Windows 10 protection?

As of February 2018, the share of Windows PC users with Windows 10 operating systems installed on their desktop computers was 43%. On such computers, the antivirus is installed by default - the system is protected by the Windows Defender program, which is included in the operating system.

The standard antivirus, which, judging by statistics, is used by most people, was only 17th in the ranking. In terms of overall performance, Windows Defender scored 3.5 out of a possible 5.5.

The built-in protection of the latest versions of Windows is getting better every year, but it still does not match the level of many specialized antivirus programs, including those that are distributed free of charge. Windows Defender showed satisfactory results in terms of online protection, but completely failed the phishing and anti-ransomware tests. By the way, protection against phishing is claimed by antivirus manufacturers. It also turned out that it does a poor job of protecting your computer offline.

Windows Defender is quite simple in terms of design. It clearly reports the presence of a particular threat, clearly demonstrates the level of protection and has a “parental control” function that limits children from visiting unwanted resources.

Windows 10's standard protection is only decent. Based on the overall rating, 16 programs for protecting a personal computer on Windows OS turned out to be better than it. Including four free ones.

In theory, you can rely only on Windows Defender if the user has regular updates turned on, their computer is connected to the Internet most of the time, and they are advanced enough to consciously avoid visiting suspicious sites. However, Roskachestvo recommends installing a specialized anti-virus package for greater confidence in the security of your PC.

How we tested

Testing was carried out in the world's most qualified laboratory specializing in antivirus programs over a period of six months. A total of four groups of malware protection tests were conducted: general online protection test, offline test, false positive rate test, and automatic and on-demand scanning test. To a lesser extent, the final rating was influenced by checking the ease of use of the antivirus and its effect on the speed of the computer.

• General protection

Each antivirus package was tested online against a set of viruses, totaling more than 40,000. It was also checked how well the antivirus copes with phishing attacks - when someone tries to gain access to the user's confidential data. A test was carried out for protection against ransomware, which restricts access to a computer and data on it for the purpose of ransom. In addition, an online test of a USB drive containing malware is carried out. It is needed to find out how well the antivirus copes with finding and eliminating viruses when neither the presence of malicious files nor their origin is known in advance.

• USB offline test

Detection of malware located on a USB drive connected to a computer. Before the scan, the computer was disconnected from the Internet for several weeks so that the anti-virus packages were not 100% up-to-date.

• False alarm

We tested how effectively the antivirus identifies real threats and skips files that are actually safe, but which the product classifies as dangerous.

• Automatic and on-demand scanning test

We tested how effectively the scanning function works when automatically scanning the computer for malware and when running it manually. The study also tested whether scanning could be scheduled for specific times when the computer was not in use.