For people using Win10 or Win11, is any free version of anti-malware/anti-virus etc needed? (and if so, suggest one)

[Kyriakos]

Like the title says, is such a program actually needed, and if one is of use (the free version), which would in your view be the least bulky/resource-eating while still helpful?
Maybe @EvaDK , @Gorbles ?

I was using 360 Total Security for a while, but lately the pop-up adds just are ridiculously numerous, frequent and annoying.

 

[Gorbles]

Windows Defender is more than fine in my experience.

Unfortunately many free offerings have either gone the way of an incredibly poor user experience (popups, etc) or have locked features behind paid support. For that reason (I used to use KOMODO), I haven't kept up with suggestions.

 

[Kyriakos]

Thanks, friend ^_^

 

[Arren]

I use the free version of BitDefender. If you search online for “BitDefender free”, you get straight to the download.

It’s not bad. You could probably get away with Win Defender (as the other post said), but I feel safer with the full antivirus. (I’m no genius at computers, though. )

Also, BitDefender gives you a VPN which (it claims) hides your IP from the world. I’m not madly paranoid about that sort of thing, but it’s no harm.

It doesn’t slow down the machine, either, so I figure, why not.

You mentioned pop-ups and ads. I haven’t found BitDefender too bad for that. It gave me a free trial of an upgrade for a while, but didn’t give me any problem about going back afterwards to the free version without paying anything. No ads since then.

If you want alternatives, I think AVG still does a free version. Others I’ve tried are Norton, McAfee, and Kapersky. But all these were on previous versions of Windows, so my info may be out of date.

Best of luck!!

 

[Quintillus]

Is Avira (https://www.avira.com/en/free-antivirus) still a good one? Along with AVG that is the one that I remember being a free option back in the day. I can't remember which one I used back then, the names are similar, but they are different products.

It appears that Sophos (https://secure2.sophos.com/en-us/ products/free-tools) has a free home version now too. That was the anti-virus we had when I was at university, and at the time it did well on the "not very resource-intensive" front.

MalwareBytes is also a good option for free on-demand scanning if you've got something fishy going on, although they charge for their continuous real-time protection product. Still, a good supplemental option.

Norton, McAfee, and Kaspersky only offer free trials which expire after 30 days (and I'm not sure McAfee offers even that). Similarly with ESET, my general go-to for paid options.

Performance will vary by solution and the power of the computer you have. I have Norton currently, since it offered the best VPN-included deal and I wanted to be able to watch non-American Olympics coverage. When Civ4 was new, Norton was awful from a performance standpoint. Now, with my current laptop (a 2022 model), it's hardly noticeable. But on my 2011 desktop, there's a noticeable difference in responsiveness with it enabled versus disabled, whereas I don't remember ESET having a noticeable performance impact on the same system. Maybe now that the Olympics are over I should try Sophos's free version...

I recall you got a newer computer a year or so ago, so my guess is most options will have acceptable performance. But it sounds like there are at least four options to consider in addition to Windows Defender.