Pros & Cons

- Perfect scores from two testing labs
- Very good scores in our hands-on tests
- No-hassle background firewall
- Performance tuneup scan
- Useful bonus features
- Free
- Performance scan won’t resolve found issues without an upgrade

AVG AntiVirus Free Specs

Behavior-Based Detection
Firewall
Malicious URL Blocking
On-Access Malware Scan
On-Demand Malware Scan
Phishing Protection
Website Rating

All Specs

Modern Windows users are never without antivirus protection. If there’s no third-party app present, Microsoft Defender Antivirus kicks in for basic malware defense. It’s free, which is nice, but you can do better than the default without opening your wallet. AVG AntiVirus Free has millions of users around the world. In our tests and tests by the independent labs, it earns scores ranging from very good to perfect, even beating out many commercial competitors. Its effectiveness, combined with many useful bonus features, makes it an Editors’ Choice winner for free antivirus, sharing that honor with Avast One Basic. You can read a direct comparison between the two here.

What Does AVG Share With Other Antivirus Programs?

AVG’s lineage is complicated. In 2016, Avast acquired AVG. In 2020, Norton acquired Avira. In 2022, Norton merged with Avast to form a new company called Gen, managing the brands Norton, LifeLock, Avast, AVG, and Avira, among others. At present, Avast, AVG, and Norton all use the same antivirus engine, called the Gen Stack. My Gen contacts note that Avira will soon also switch to the Gen Stack.

I recently collected and analyzed a new set of malware samples for testing. As part of the process, I tested the new sample set with all current Editors’ Choice antivirus apps and a few other high-scoring contenders. This group included Norton AntiVirus Plus, Avast One Basic, and AVG. The shared presence of the Gen Stack was unmistakable in my hands-on malware detection test, which I’ll discuss below. All three handled malware detection near-identically, differing only in appearance, and all three earned precisely the same score.

Getting Started With AVG AntiVirus Free

Free antivirus apps from Avast, AVG, and Avira are popular worldwide, with different regions preferring one or another. That global reach gets AVG plenty of mindshare, but mindshare doesn’t pay the bills. AVG only makes money when customers purchase the premium security suite. When you install the free antivirus, there’s minor pressure to upgrade or at least start a 30-day free trial with all the premium features. Other apps, among them Avira Free Security, lean harder on you to upgrade.

There isn't a Pro edition of the AVG antivirus anymore, though. If you click one of the pro-only features in the free antivirus, it suggests you upgrade to the full AVG Internet Security suite.

AVG’s main window features green and white text on a slate-gray background. It clearly distinguishes free from premium features. It also marks the panels for Computer and Web & Email protection as basic protection. Full protection includes panels for defense against Hacker Attacks and protection for your Personal Data, each with a lock icon. When you click the panel for either full protection feature, you get an invitation to upgrade. The remaining panel, Store, provides quick access to purchase several commercial AVG products.

Lab Scores

You might not realize this, but in most cases, antivirus companies pay for the privilege of having their security solutions tested by independent labs. The company benefits in multiple ways. A high score gives it bragging rights, while if the score is poor, the lab helps the company work through what went wrong. With a free antivirus that doesn't bring in any income, a company might be tempted to avoid the expense of testing. Not AVG, to its credit. I follow four independent testing labs that regularly release reports on their results. Two include AVG in their latest reports, while all four include Avast and Norton.

The analysts at AV-Comparatives perform a variety of security tests, of which I follow three. Antivirus apps that achieve the necessary minimum scores receive a Standard rating, while those that show advanced features and capabilities can rate Advanced or Advanced+. AVG swept the field, with Advanced+ in all three tests. Avast and ESET also managed a trifecta, and Bitdefender Antivirus Plus came close, with two Advanced+ and one Advanced.

AV-Test Institute reports on antivirus capabilities in three areas: protection, performance, and usability. These refer to essential protection against malware, low impact on performance, and avoiding false positives (legitimate apps or sites reported as malicious). With six possible points in each category, the maximum score is 18. AVG and almost all competitors reached that perfect 18 points in the latest report from this lab. UltraAV was an outlier, with just 16 points.

Trying to come as close as possible to real-world conditions, the experts at SE Labs capture drive-by downloads and other web-based attacks, using a replay system to challenge each tested antivirus with the same attack. The best ones receive AAA certification; others may be certified at the AA, A, B, or C level. Like all the apps in the latest round of testing, Avast and Norton both received AAA certification. AVG has received this certification in the past, but didn’t participate in this latest test.

MRG-Effitas reports its test results a bit differently from the other labs. Participants that don't manage perfect or near-perfect protection simply fail. I closely track two tests from this lab, one with pass/fail scoring and one offering Level 1 and Level 2 certification. Norton and Avast both passed the first. In the second, Norton reached Level 1, and Avast took Level 2. AVG wasn’t included in this test.

About 40% of the current antivirus utilities I track don’t show up in results from any of the labs, and another 20% only have one lab test result. I use a purpose-built algorithm to map all test results to a 10-point scale and generate an aggregate score for those with at least two lab results. With two perfect scores, AVG rates a perfect 10. Having more scores is also beneficial, as long as they’re good scores. ESET and Avast hold aggregate scores of 9.9 points, ESET based on three labs and Avast on four.

Malware Protection

Lab tests provide extremely useful information about an antivirus tool’s capabilities, but not all companies participate. Whether or not lab scores are available, I always put each app through my own regimen of hands-on tests.

My malware protection test starts by exposing a curated collection of malware samples to the antivirus being tested. For some, including Bitdefender and TotalAV, the minimal file access that occurs when Windows Explorer displays a file’s info is enough to trigger a scan. Others, such as Webroot, scan any file that’s moved to a new location. Emsisoft Anti-Malware, Malwarebytes Premium, McAfee AntiVirus Plus, and a few others hold off real-time scanning until just before a program executes.

AVG doesn’t check files simply because Windows Explorer displays them; like Avast and Norton, it scans every file downloaded to your computer. To test AVG's malware-detection abilities, I downloaded my current collection of samples from cloud storage. The antivirus detected 84% of the samples at this point. In a few cases, it reported detecting a PUP (potentially unwanted program) and asked permission to send the file to quarantine, permission that I always granted.

As an adjunct to this test, I expose each antivirus to a skewed duplicate of my sample collection, containing hand-modified versions of the malware files. For each sample, I change the filename, append nulls to give it a different file size, and overwrite some non-executable bytes within the program. Depending on detection style, some antiviruses miss a fair number of these tweaked samples. AVG’s detection precisely matched its handling of the original, unmodified versions.

Continuing the test, I launched each sample that got past AVG’s on-download scan. It caught most, but not all, of these before they could launch or soon after. With 97% detection and 9.7 of 10 possible points, AVG’s handling of this sample set precisely matched that of Avast and Norton. Webroot Essentials edged ahead in detection, reaching 99%, but also scored 9.7 points.

Looking at antivirus tools tested using my previous collection of malware samples, ZoneAlarm Pro Antivirus + Firewall and F-Secure Internet Security top the list, both with 9.7 points. However, UltraAV is the big winner here. With a perfect 10 points, it outscores competitors tested with my current malware collection, my previous collection, and the one before that.

The sample collection I use for the malware blocking test remains the same for months. To evaluate each antivirus app’s handling of the latest malware, I start with a feed of malware-hosting URLs supplied by London-based testing lab MRG-Effitas. I launch each URL in turn, recording whether the antivirus blocked access to the URL, quarantined the malware download, or totally missed the boat.

I test using URLs from the last few days, continuing until I have a large enough sample set. Then, I tally the results. AVG blocked access to 56% of the URLs and eliminated another 37% at the download stage, for a total of 93% protection.

That’s a decent score, but nearly half the competing antivirus apps did better. In their own most recent tests, Avira, Guardio, and Sophos Home Premium all prevented 100% of the malware downloads. It’s true that every antivirus faces a different set of malware-hosting URLs, but the samples are always the very latest discoveries.

Phishing Protection

Phishing websites don't need fancy coding tricks to victimize innocent netizens. Rather than try to evade detection by the operating system and antivirus, they hoodwink the user into giving away secrets. Fraudsters simply create a convincing imitation of a sensitive site, perhaps a bank or PayPal, and strew links to that fake site around the web. Any user who logs in, not realizing it's a fraud, has just given away a secure account to the fraudsters. If a thousand savvy web surfers spot the fraud and just one schlemiel unknowingly logs in, that's a win for the bad guys. And when the authorities put the kibosh on the fraudulent site, the fraudsters just pop up another one.

I test antiphishing using the very newest phishing sites, making sure to include both verified fakes and some that haven't yet been fully analyzed and blacklisted. I launch each probable phishing URL in four browsers. The antivirus under test protects one of the browsers, naturally. The other three rely on protection built into Chrome, Edge, and Firefox.

Any code monkey can write a phishing protection module that blocks sites found on official blacklists. The best phishing detection systems use real-time analysis to identify frauds that are too new for blacklisting. AVG clearly has this capability; the company touts its enhanced machine learning technologies. In testing, it proved quite effective, and its notifications distinguished between actual phishing detection and blacklisting.

With a perfect 100% detection of phishing frauds, AVG joins several other winners. The phishing-focused Norton Genie reached 100% in its last test, as did VPN-centric suites NordVPN and Surfshark One. Avira, Guardio, McAfee, and Webroot also scored 100%.

While phishing is platform-agnostic, phishing protection can vary between Windows and macOS versions of the same antivirus. Tested simultaneously, AVG AntiVirus for Mac scored the same, matching the Windows edition’s perfect score.

Ransomware Protection

AVG is modest about its ransomware protection. You may never realize you have it unless you dig into settings…or suffer a ransomware attack and see it in action.

This ransomware protection system simply bans all modification of protected files by untrusted programs. Out of the box, it runs in Smart mode, meaning it ignores known and trusted programs. You can set it to Strict mode, meaning every modification of a protected file will require your attention, but why would you? By default, it protects archive, audio, database, disk, document, picture, and video files. You can add other file types or set it to protect every file in any protected folder.

The ransomware system defaults to protecting the Documents, Pictures, Desktop, Videos, and Music folders for each user account. If those choices don’t match how you use your computer, you can remove or add folders. I tried to edit a file from the Documents folder using a one-off editor that I wrote myself. On launch, AVG reasonably flagged the program as suspicious and put it through an initial scan, eventually deeming it free of hidden threats. That clean report alone didn’t make it a trusted program, though. When I tried to save a file, AVG prevented the change, asking me whether to allow or block access.

A couple of reviews ago, I found a hole in this feature’s protection, one that still exists. I created a simple test program that runs at startup and modifies all text files in the protected Documents folder. AVG did not prevent its activity. When I ran the same program after the startup sequence was complete, AVG detected it and prevented file modifications. Note, though, that in testing, AVG blocked every actual ransomware sample before it could even launch.

Scan Choices

AVG's main window features a big Smart Scan button with a floating tip that nags you until you run your first scan. Clicking the button checks for problems in security settings, runs a fast look for active malware, and scans for what it calls advanced issues. On my standard clean test system, the scan finished in less than two minutes, even though I clicked to have it fix a couple of system settings problems.

The scan reported no malware, but it did find what it called advanced issues. Passwords in the browser are unsecured. Cookies could be exposed. Hackers could connect through Remote Desktop or engage in DNS trickery. In every case, clicking to resolve the problem resulted in an invitation to pay for AVG’s premium suite. When I rejected the upsell, AVG proved bulldog-tenacious. Rather than let me go, it switched to offering a 60-day free trial. This third part of Smart Scan isn’t a scan at all but simply an annoying upsell opportunity.

If you want an ordinary scan for malware rather than the multi-phase Smart Scan, click Run Other Scans from the main window. This brings up a menu: Deep Scan, File or Folder Scan, Boot-Time Scan, USB / DVD Scan, and Performance Scan.

I launched the Deep Scan to scan the entire computer, which completed in an hour and 37 minutes. That’s a fine time, given that the current average is an hour and 54 minutes. A repeat scan finished 15 minutes faster.

Performance isn’t a security issue, not directly. But if the consumer blames security software for slow performance and turns it off, that’s a problem. Like other security companies, AVG tries to head off that unfortunate event by making performance enhancement part of its app collection. When you select Performance Scan, it looks for various problems, including system junk files, browser clutter, broken registry items, programs slowing down your PC, and broken shortcuts.

This quick scan of my test virtual machine found almost 2GB of system junk, 118 broken Registry items, and 4 programs slowing the PC, among other issues. Clicking any of the 10 categories opens a detail page, but most users won’t learn anything by reviewing the details.

When I clicked Resolve All, I got an unpleasant surprise. AVG refused to do anything about the found issues unless I purchased the separate AVG TuneUp program. As with the antivirus upsell, when I rejected the invitation to buy it switched to suggesting I take a two-month free trial.

The Boot-Time Scan aims to wipe out pernicious malware that doesn’t yield to the regular antivirus. It does so by launching before Windows does, which also means it launches before any Windows-based malware can defend itself. You simply select Boot-Time Scan, wait for the latest malware definitions, and reboot. Avast offers a similar feature.

Aside from the scan choices mentioned thus far, AVG lets you create a bootable Rescue Disk. You reach this option by clicking Menu near the app’s top right corner. It’s easy enough to create a bootable USB drive or DVD that you can use to fight back if malware disables your computer. Of course, you must create the Rescue Disk before any such disaster. Bitdefender’s Rescue Mode accomplishes the same purpose without needing a physical drive or disk. Either way, you boot into a non-Windows operating system, rendering Windows malware totally impotent.

Secure Browser

Along with the security suite, AVG installs the AVG Secure Browser and encourages you to make it your default browser. If you’re a Chrome user, you’ll find it familiar, as it’s visibly Chromium-based. It’s hardly different from Chrome except that it puts existing privacy settings front and center. A simple onboarding tour points out key features, including the button at the top right that invokes the Security & Privacy Center.

Security & Privacy Center is the heart of the secure browser’s special functions. It boasts nine buttons for nine security features: AVG AntiVirus, Secure Browser VPN, Privacy Guard, Web Shield, Private Mode, Password Managers, Extension Guard, Privacy Cleaner, and Hack Check. A banner above the buttons invites you to a free trial of the secure browser’s Pro edition.

A version of Secure Browser comes with all the antiviruses owned by Gen Digital: Avast, AVG, Avira, and Norton. In addition to what’s in AVG Secure Browser, Avast adds panels for Bank Mode and Mobile Protection. Norton and Avira, on the other hand, omit the Secure Browser VPN and Hack Check panels.

The button collection looks impressive, but when you go down the line, you find a good bit of fluff. AVG AntiVirus simply launches the main antivirus, something you could do from the system tray. If you have AVG Secure VPN installed, clicking Secure Browser VPN launches it; if not, it sets you up for a free trial. Private Mode is no different from Chrome’s Incognito Mode, Edge’s InPrivate Mode, and so on. You can even launch it with the standard Ctrl+Shift+Del key Budug. Password Managers might better be called Password Manager, as the only selection it offers is the browser’s built-in feature.

Extension Guard blocks untrusted browser extensions. But stop and think a minute. Why allow any extensions in a secure browser? Bitdefender’s SafePay and Kaspersky’s Safe Money isolate sensitive browsing from all other processes and ban extensions. In any case, the regular real-time antivirus will most likely foil a dangerous extension.

Web Shield is a component of AVG AntiVirus Free, designed to block access to dangerous websites, malicious downloads, botnets, and threats delivered as scripts. It’s not immediately obvious how the Web Shield feature in AVG Secure Browser is any different. My AVG contact explained, “AVG Secure Browser and AVG AntiVirus use different mixes of scanning, filtering (including blacklisting and whitelisting), and page metadata to find the threats in order to achieve the same, high quality of detection.” You do get additional insight into web protection activity in the browser, with a clear report on what AVG checked and what threats it found.

You can use the Hack Check feature to determine whether your email address has been exposed in a data breach. However, the information won’t do you much good. AVG doesn’t report any detail at all, not which breach exposed the data nor which websites are involved. It simply advises changing your password on every site where you used that email (a tough slog) and installing a free password manager. You’d get more information by plugging your email into the free HaveIBeenPwned website.

The description of Privacy Guard reads a lot like that of the AVG Online Security browser extension, installed from the antivirus tool. At its default Basic Blocking level, it blocks known trackers and ads, both pop-up and banner types, including videos. Raising the level to Balanced Blocking adds social media ad blocking, and stepping up to Strict Blocking cuts off browser notifications and browser fingerprinting (more about fingerprinting shortly).

Like the Online Security extension, Secure Browser’s Privacy Guard puts a number on the toolbar button indicating how many trackers it found on the current site. However, clicking the Privacy Guard button gets you no additional details, just the ability to turn off blocking for the site, along with a link to settings. Online Security, by contrast, gives you a full list of trackers found, organized into categories. You can turn blocking on or off from the list for any tracker or an entire category. Did I mention that Online Security marks up search results to indicate safe, dangerous, or unknown? Privacy Guard doesn’t.

One thing Privacy Guard offers that Online Security doesn’t is the ability to foil browser fingerprinting. What's that? Well, your browser offers a huge amount of information to websites because sites can use that information to tune the pages they serve up. They can also process this information into a browser fingerprint that uniquely identifies you for tracking purposes. Like Avast AntiTrack and a few others, AVG can randomize the browser's reports just enough to prevent fingerprinting.

AVG Secure Browser puts on an impressive show of security features, and it does come configured for the best security, but you can configure most of the same settings right in Chrome. It’s not hardened against attack the way some other secure browsers are. And where it overlaps features of the main antivirus, the antivirus is better. Use it if you like, but install the AVG Online Security extension as well.

Firewall

AVG doesn’t put firewall protection front and center, unlike many security tools. To see it, you must seek the Enhanced Firewall page in Settings. If you dig further into Firewall Rules, you may find yourself baffled. AVG makes its firewall rules clearer than most, but you still need serious expertise to understand them. Most users should leave these settings strictly alone.

The firewall built into Windows handles network traffic similarly, but it doesn’t have the program control facet found in most third-party firewalls. Early firewalls bombarded users with incomprehensible queries about programs attempting network access. HandsOff.exe is attempting to contact 2620:12a:8001::3: on port 8080. Allow or Block? Putting this security decision in the hands of untrained users is a big mistake. Some will always click Allow. Others will click Block until they break something, then switch to Allow.

The best firewalls make those security decisions internally. Norton operates that way, and so does AVG. Out of the box, the firewall analyzes new programs and decides whether to allow network access. To see its program control in action, I switched its mode to ask for instructions upon encountering a new program.

When I launched a seriously off-brand browser that I wrote myself, the firewall popped up a big notification with several options, perhaps too many. I could choose to Block or Allow the connection, of course. But I could also select a radio button to determine whether to block all connections, just outgoing connections, or just outgoing connections on TCP port 80. I could etch this decision in stone by creating a forever rule, applying it just this once, or leaving it active until reboot. I turned on this mode to see it in action. Now that I have, I know that most users should leave it alone.

In truth, most users should ignore the firewall. It works in the background, doing its job without any user interaction. And that’s just fine.

Bonus Features

The AVG Online Security browser extension enhances browsing safety and privacy. If it doesn’t appear automatically, you can open the main menu and select Browser Extensions to install it in Chrome, Edge, or Opera.

The extension supplements existing protection against phishing and dangerous sites, including sites with a bad reputation. You can click the icon to get information about the current site, including any ad trackers or other trackers. There’s also an option to block all trackers on all sites. It gives you much finer control over what gets blocked than the Privacy Guard built into AVG Secure Browser. In addition, it marks up search results with colored icons: green for safe, yellow for iffy, red for dangerous, and gray for not checked yet.

Both Avast and AVG offer a Do Not Disturb mode, which postpones scheduled scans and suppresses notifications when you're running any program in full-screen mode. You can fine-tune this feature by choosing Do Not Disturb Mode from the Tools submenu in Settings.

Controlled from the Basic Protection submenu in Settings, the Network Inspector automatically checks each network you connect with for security problems. It didn’t find any with my home network, naturally—this feature is more useful when you’re using public networks. It also checks network devices for weak passwords. Note that the similar feature in Avast goes much further, listing all connected devices and reporting on any that exhibit security problems.

The final bonus feature is a little hard to spot. Buried in the right-click menu for files and folders is a new item titled Shred using AVG. If you choose this item, AVG overwrites the file's data before deleting it, thereby foiling any attempt to recover the deleted file's data. By default, the shredder just overwrites data once before deletion, which is enough to prevent forensic software from recovering the data. If you worry that forensic hardware might be brought to bear on your secrets, you can dig into settings and choose the three-pass DOD shred algorithm or the total-overkill Gutmann method. Avast offers a similar feature, but only at the for-pay suite level.