Free Antivirus Software, Free Online Virus Scan

The free antivirus programs listed on this page allow you to detect computer viruses, remove or repair infected files, prevent infection, detect and remove email viruses, etc. There are also free online virus scanning services available for those who prefer (or need to) scan for virus that way.

Note that a number of the free antivirus software listed have limited support for scanning spyware and other types of non-virus malware that their commercial equivalents provide. If you are looking for commercial antivirus software, the ones that come highly recommended by security-conscious people are Avira Antivir Premium (very light on resources), Kaspersky Anti-Virus and ESET NOD32 Antivirus (also light on resources). Popular among average computer users is Symantec's Norton 360, a version of their antivirus program that includes a firewall, automatic backup and restore program and general all-round protection.

If your system is already infected, you may also want to take a look at the Free Antivirus Rescue CDs and DVDs page.

Free AntiVirus Utilities

AntiVir Personal Edition

AntiVir Personal Edition is a free antivirus program for Windows computers. It has a resident component that monitors file movements for signs of viruses. It also allows you to scan your computer and repair files that have been infected. The program comes with a facility to automatically check the AntiVir website for updates to the virus definitions and download them. The free version pops up an annoying banner each time it updates, and does not scan/remove spyware that the Premium version (commercial) does. (Incidentally, the Premium version is a well-regarded anti-malware software.)

AVG Anti-Virus

The AVG Anti-Virus software comprises a resident program that works in the background, an email scanner (checks your email for viruses), an on-demand scanner (eg, you invoke it to scan your system), the ability to repair certain infected files, and automatic updates of the virus definitions. A more fully featured commercial version, is also available.

avast! Home Edition

avast! Home Edition is free for home users on non-commercial computers. You have to register your copy and supply them your email address (get a free email address here if you wish) so that they can send you a license key to activate the program.

Rising Antivirus

Rising Antivirus is a new antivirus software that guards against virus, trojans, worms and rootkits. Besides the usual resident scanner, it also checks your incoming and outgoing email (POP3/SMTP), watches out for hidden processes and malicious behaviour, and has application access control and program startup control (probably meaning some sort of host intrusion prevention system).

Comodo Antivirus

Comodo Antivirus provides real-time scanning, where it resides in memory and checks your programs for viruses as they are run, as well as on-demand scanning for viruses. You can also schedule your scans. It automatically updates itself through the internet. This is a Windows program.

Clam AntiVirus

ClamAV is a free command line antivirus scanner for Unix systems. You can also integrate it with your mail server for scanning your email messages and attachments. It is able to scan inside archives like RAR archives, Zip archives, Gzip and Bzip2 archives (that is, it has unpacking engines for those types of compressed archives). If you are a programmer, you can even integrate the antivirus scanner into your own programs. This free antivirus program comes with source code that is released under the GNU General Public License. Prebuilt binary packages are available for numerous Linux distributions (Debian, RedHat / Fedora, PLD Linux, Mandrake), Microsoft Windows, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, AIX, OSF and Solaris 8 (Sparc).

F-Prot Antivirus for Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, NetBSD and DOS

F-Prot Antivirus for DOS, Linux and BSD (FreeBSD, OpenBSD and NetBSD) is free for personal use on personal workstations. (Note: these are separate downloads; scroll down on their page to find the link appropriate for your system. Also note that the Windows and Solaris versions are not free.)

Free Online Virus Scan

Jotti's Online Malware Scan

This site scans any file that you upload to it with a variety of antivirus programs. It is particularly useful if you are suspicious about a particular file, and want to see if different antivirus software detect anything in it.

BitDefender Free Online Virus Scan

This free online virus scanning service will check your system for viruses. Note that the service only works if you use Internet Explorer on Windows since it uses ActiveX controls to do the scanning. Alternatively, you can buy their software product, BitDefender Antivirus, which will allow you to protect your computer from virus, rootkits and malware threats.

Trend Micro Free Online Virus Scan

Scan your computer for viruses free with Trend Micro's online service. You will need either Netscape (3.01 or above) or Internet Explorer (4.0 or above). The European version of this service supports Internet Explorer, Firefox and the Mozilla browser only.