Best antivirus for Mac: 15 security apps you can trust

Covers: macOS

Intego’s Mac Internet Security X9 combines the company’s VirusBarrier and NetBarrier applications to provide both antiviral protection and network traffic filtering programs. There’s also an Intego Premium Bundle X9 that includes five apps: VirusBarrier and NetBarrier as well as Mac Washing Machine (a Mac cleaner), ContentBarrier (Parental controls) and Personal Backup (a bootable backup).

Intego’s Internet Security costs $24.99/£20.99 for the first year. Intego’s Mac Premium Bundle costs $29.99/£23.99 for the first year. Use our link to get the deal: You can get Intego Mac Internet Security X9 and Mac Premium Bundle here.

The Mac Internet Security X9 is easy to download, install, and configure. It checks for the latest viral definitions and sets up real-time scanning features and intuitive network monitoring, allowing users to see and work with both incoming and outgoing Internet connections on their Mac.

While Mac Security X9 doesn’t offer every feature, it offers impressive configuration and customization to both its VirusBarrier and NetBarrier tools. VirusBarrier performs well in protecting users from viruses, while NetBarrier acts as a firewall that protects connections. The application allows users to create settings for home, work, or public connections, and allows or deny connections as needed.

There are some issues to address, we’d like to see a running counter tracking the number of files processed in a VirusBarrier scan and we were disappointed that it allowed traffic to questionable websites linked to spam messages. 

Mac Internet Security X9 doesn’t try to upsell users to Intego’s other suites and services. The tools in place are effective, work well, and make this utility worth considering.

• AV Comparatives, June 2024: 99% Mac Malware Protection, 93% Mac PUA Protection, 100% Windows Malware Detection.

Covers: macOS

AVG Internet Security for Mac is easy to download from the AVG website, downloads and installs easily, and once permissions have been assigned to your entire hard drive, you’re good to go. Best of all, it is available as a 60-day trial period before billing begins.

AVG Internet Security focuses on four directives: Computer Protection, Web & Email Protection, Hacks Attacks, and Payment Protection. The Smart Scan feature checks your virus definitions to make sure they’re up to date and scans for viruses and malware. A Ransomware Shield, Network Inspector, and Fake Website Shield features look things over to see where you stand in terms of your overall online presence and security.

The set of whitelists and exceptions can be customized to hone in on files you want to scan and leave out areas you want to leave alone. A quick antiviral scan took a few minutes while a full scan of an entire NVME drive with 821GB of data on it took just over 5.5 hours to complete.

Scans on external drives and specific folders are easy to set up and execute, the scheduling feature works well, the software can set up location configurations, and there are customization options for network security.

Tests with malware and phishing-based websites went well. The software, combined with macOS’s Gatekeeper functionality, stopped the vast majority of sample malware installations, quarantining them quickly and preventing installation. The software also prevented questionable external code from being loaded on suspect websites and blocked phishing sites from loading.

There are a few places for improvement with AVG Internet Security for Mac, but not many. During testing, the software allowed a fake version of Adobe Flash Player to be installed. If you do override the macOS Gatekeeper and AVG security features and install malware, AVG Internet Security does a good job of removing it.

If there’s one thing I might change about the software, it’s the fact that the scheduled scan feature doesn’t readily display that the scan is taking place.

AVG Internet Security for Mac catches an impressive amount of viral, phishing, and malware activity for a consumer package, and does its job well, all while wrapped in a bright, friendly user interface that’s easy to navigate. Granted, given the subscription pricing and packages, a VPN client wouldn’t be out of the question, and the price point for a single device moves into questionable territory, but the software still performs well, travels well with its location settings, and this is appreciated.

Have a look at its 60-day trial to see what works, what doesn’t, and what might be right for you. You may also be interested in trying the free AVG AntiVirus for the Mac. Despite being free, AVG’s free AntiVirus covers all the bases: blocking viruses and malware from websites, downloads, and email attachments. AVG will scan applications and check every file and remove threats from your Mac. It auto updates so you shouldn’t miss out on protection from the latest threats.

• AV Test, December 2024: 100%
• AV Comparatives, AV Comparatives, June 2024: 100% Mac Malware Protection, 98% Mac PUA Protection, 100% Windows Malware Detection.

Get AVG Internet Security or AVG AntiVirus for the Mac.

Covers: Mac, PC, iOS and Android

There are four Mac antivirus products from Avast. The paid for Avast Premium Security and Avast One, and the free Avast Free Antivirus and Avast One Essential. Avast Free Antivirus is a free version of Avast Premium Security, while Avast One Essential offers additional features like ransomware protection, privacy protection, and data leak detection. 

Avast Premium Security is a well-featured suite that protects your Mac from various threats, including browser script hacks, ransomware, and remote attack activity. It includes modules such as Virus Scans, Core Shields, Traffic Monitor, Network Inspector, Email Guardian, Ransomware Shield, and Quarantine, all easily accessible from the home screen.

Virus scan options include Smart Scan, Deep Scan, Targeted Scan, or External Storage Scan. The Traffic Monitor shows data usage and bandwidth usage, while Network Inspector scans the network for safety and alerts users when unfamiliar devices join the network. Core Shields prevents fake websites from loading and triggering software.

The main frustration with Avast Premium Security is its subscription-based model, but that tends to be standard these days. Some features are only available on the Avast Ultimate subscription tier.

Those looking to save money can try the two free Antivirus for Mac solutions, Avast Free Antivirus and Avast One Essential. If you want just a virus scanner, we recommend Avast’s Free Antivirus, which is the free version of Avast Premium Security. Avast One offers some additional functions and a different interface, but and annoys with intensive advertising for paid functions.

You can get Avast Premium Security for Mac here. Also consider Avast One, Avast Free Antivirus and Avast One Essential.

• AV Test, December 2024: 100%
• AV Comparatives, June 2024: Approved, 100% Mac Malware Protection, 98% Mac PUA Protection, 100% Windows Malware Detection.

Covers: macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, ChromeOS

McAfee Total Protection continues to be steadily updated and offers a good suite of anti-viral, anti-malware, identity protection, VPN, and scheduling tools. It is simple to use; once you’ve walked through the guided steps for assigning permissions to work behind the scenes you can just leave it to get on with its job.

The software can perform a full scan of your hard drive as well as scan custom locations such as external volumes, and schedule scan times. You can control what Total Protection does when it finds suspect files, such as notifying you, quarantining them, or deleting the files. During our tests, it located and quarantined two suspected virus files I didn’t know about, thereby earning its keep.

Other features include an ID Protection tool that compares your email address to known data and password breaches, a firewall, and a Secure VPN feature that lets you quickly set up a Virtual Private Network (VPN).

McAfee’s Total Protection package extends up to five devices on one account, so it’s easy to add the app to other Macs, iPhones, iPads, and Android-based phones and tablets as needed. It’s worth noting that the Windows version offers features that you don’t get in the Mac app.

We noted some occasional performance impacts as it ran in the background, but it was largely unobtrusive in its efforts. Our only other grumble is the lack of simplicity in ending the trial.

You can get McAfee Total Protection here.

Covers: macOS, Windows, iOS, Android

Norton 360 provides protection in Mac OS X 10.10 or later, with a reduced price for the first year. The Standard package protects one device. For more devices (including Macs, iPhones or PCs), the Deluxe or Select package are required. Note that all prices increase significantly after the first year. 

The software offers 110GB of cloud-based backup, a password manager, a basic VPN client, and Dark Web monitoring.

Norton 360 is easy to download and install, and its add-on programs work fairly well. The VPN is basic but easy to configure your preferred country of origin and initiate a connection. The password manager is reliable and includes a downloadable recovery key. There is an admirable level of possible customization on the firewall, although technical knowledge is needed.

Other utilities within Norton 360 for Mac include a Startup Manager module, File Cleanup module, and Dark Web protection module. With antiviral monitoring and scanning it’s easy to create white lists and exceptions as well as schedule scans, including of external volumes like USB thumb drives. However, the application still can’t perform scans on .zip files, I had to decompress the text drive of sample infections before it could see them. 

In our tests, the software was successful in catching a good amount of viral activity, with 25 individual infections detected on a test drive after scanning it. However, Norton 360 for Mac missed the OSX.Proton malware.

Extensions for web browsers and Norton Private Browser are included. These warn about spam and phishing-based websites, but still allowed us to travel to questionable websites from spam email links. 

However, there are still bugs to sort out, such as a bug in the Cloud Backup were we were unable to successfully click the “Get Started with Backup” button and create an initial backup set for the cloud. It also failed to remove OSX.Proton malware.

• AV Test, December 2024: 100%

You can get Norton 360 here.

Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac covers: macOS, Bitdefender Total Security covers: macOS, Windows, iOS, Android

Bitdefender is another maker of antivirus solutions that has a number of solutions for the Mac, including a free option. There’s Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac, which offers basic protection for up to three Macs, Bitdefender Total Security, which protects up to five devices (macOS, iOS, Windows and Android), and Bitdefender’s free Virus Scanner for Mac, which we review here: Bitdefender’s free Virus Scanner Review.

Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac is easy to download, install, and assign full drive permissions. It offers a speedy Quick Scan mode that performs a quick overview and locate, quarantine, and remove viral candidates within a few minutes as well as a Full Scan mode which runs in the background so you can continue to work. External volumes such as USB flash drives can be scanned. 

There isn’t much in the way of malware that gets by it. However, we found the application’s ability to locate and neutralize malware that was already on the system mixed – it missed four significant pieces of malware. 

Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac offers anti-phishing protection in the form of web browser extensions for the Safari, Google Chrome, and Mozilla Firefox web browsers. These offered varying degrees of success. Under Safari, Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac offered no prominent phishing protection, allowing us to visit questionable websites with no warning whatsoever.

Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac offers an anti-tracker for web browsers and access to a VPN with basic functionality and a limit of 200MB a day. It encourages you to update to the full version, there are better VPNs for Mac out there.

When we reviewed it Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac retailed at “50% off” which is $19.99/£14.99 a year for one Mac (then $39.99/£29.99 a year), but the deal prices change often. There is also a 30-day trial available. 

There is also Bitdefender Total Security which includes Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac as well as coverage for iOS, Android and Windows. That software retails for $69.99/£44.99 a year for five devices (then $109.99/£74.99 a year) and offers a license that covers five devices, including Macs, Windows, Android and iOS with a 30-day trial available.

• AV Test, December 2024: 100%
• AV Comparatives, AV Comparatives, June 2024: 100% Mac Malware Protection, 99% Mac PUA Protection, 100% Windows Malware Detection.

Covers: macOS, Windows, iOS, Android

Avira Prime, the paid version of Avira’s free antiviral software Avira Free Security (see our review), provides several tools for the user. Avira Prime is designed around several modules (Virus Scans, Protection Options, Quarantine, VPN, Passwords, Cookie Cleaner, Identity Assistant, Junk Cleaner, Uninstaller, and Startup Apps). Each module can be customized and configured as needed. The software installs cleanly and requests permission to fully access the hard drive, which is par for the course. 

The Quick Scan can take less than 10 seconds, while a Full Scan took over six hours to look over 800+ gigabytes of files on a one terabyte SSD. The Custom Scan feature allows files and folders to be dropped in for quick scanning as well as external volumes to be scanned through as needed. There is a scheduler so you can program scans in advance.

You can minimize Avira Prime and work with other applications as the scan continues which is lucky because the Full Scan took over six hours to complete. Avira Prime located and quarantined several minor worm files, but missed suspect files such as the Wave web browser, which has been implicated in assorted phishing scams.

Cookie Cleaner module allows you to view and clean up cookie data, helpfully grouping cookies into different categories to make it easy to remove tracking and ads-based items in different browsers.

Junk Cleaner reclaimed a decent 55GB of space when we tried it. There’s also an uninstaller manager for cleaning up deleted apps and managing those that start automatically. 

Identity Assistant can track your email addresses, phone numbers, credit cards, bank accounts, physical addresses, driver’s license, and so on, to check for any illicit activity. 

The included Password Manager is a combination of local system and browser extensions plus a web-based management console with its own master password.

The password manager and junk files cleaner are included in both free and paid-for versions of Avira. Where Prime differs from the Free Security version is that you get full, use of the VPN service instead of a 500MB per month limit. The VPN can also block malicious website content.

You can get Avira Prime here. Also consider Avira Free Security for Mac.

Read our full Avira Free Security for Mac review.

• AV Test, December 2024: 99.5%

Covers: macOS

Trend Micro Antivirus isn’t too challenging to use, but looks almost old-fashioned compared to many competitors. The range of functions seems quite limited compared to competitors such as Norton and Avast. For example, there is no anti-phishing function and no VPN application included in the package.

There are five menu items: Overview, Web, Scans, Folder Shield, and Logs. Overview is the at-a-glance dashboard for Trend Micro Antivirus that shows that the various protections are active, the last time the app was updated and the last time a scan was run. 

Trend Micro offers a smart scan, custom scan, and full scan. In our tests Trend Micro had no trouble detecting most threats; however, in a few cases, it didn’t detect all the malware contained in a folder until a scan had been run.

Folder Shield is Trend Micro’s approach to ransomware protection. If an unknown program tries to change anything in certain folders, such as Documents, Music, Pictures, Movies, and Mobile Documents, Trend Micro will alert you. 

Trend Micro’s web extension boasts a privacy scanner that is supposed to check your privacy settings on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. 

• AV Test, March 2024: 100%

Covers: macOS

BitMedic Pro Antivirus is a good antiviral program, albeit with some shortcomings that need to be worked through, not least the fact that this hasn’t been updated since 2020.

The program, which retails for $9.99/£9.99/CA$9.99 on the Mac App Store, features a nice complement of tools, including an Antivirus Scan module, an Adware Cleaner module, a Result Log, a Custom Scan module, a Browser Privacy module, and a System Settings module that allows you to schedule deep scans, customize system behaviors, and create a whitelist of files not to scan.

Initial tests with the Antivirus Scan module’s quick scan and deep scan went well and BitMedic Pro Antivirus was able to find several phishing-based emails. The application crashed twice during testing though. Frustratingly, there was a lack of specific descriptions as to what the infected files were and their full location, even after a drop-down arrow was clicked.

The inclusion of an Adware Cleaner module is a nice touch – it performs well, and runs quickly. The Browser Privacy module functions as a quick and easy way to clean up your history, auto logins, bookmarks, remove all extensions, and reset the preferences on your browser, but this is an all-or-nothing option and we’d prefer to disable or delete individual extensions.

The $10/£10 price point with no subscription, is very appealing, but there are a few elements that let it down.

Covers: macOS

Sophos Home Premium is a well-rounded anti-piracy/anti-malware suite, its core modules centering around antivirus protection, web protection, ransomeware protection, and malicious traffic detection. 

The software is available for a good price to protect up to 10 devices. In the past Sophos offered a free version of its Home product with just the antivirus protection and website protection. That was discontinued in late 2021. There is a free 30 day trial.

We had some issues installing and getting the software set up. Everything is controlled via the Menu Bar icon and a web-based dashboard and it’s not always clear it is running.

Once you’ve signed in, it’s easy enough to customize and configure core elements such as actions that occur when malware is found, scan scheduling, and web filtering, and elements such as accessible scan logs and network file scanning.

You can choose between quick scans and full scans, which can take several hours and cover the full extent of the hard drive. While the scan scheduling feature worked well, it only allows you to set schedule times set to every 30 minutes (11:00 AM, 11:30 AM, 12:00 PM, etc). Scanning an external volume such as a thumb drive or network volume feels is harder than it should.

You can configure Web Filtering options to allow blocking for certain categories, such as adult content. The filters work reasonably well and it’s easy enough to create a whitelist to provide exceptions.

There’s room for improvement. Although Sophos Home Premium functions well with macOS’s GateKeeper feature and caught and filtered a respectable amount of test malware, it allowed the AdWind malware and an infected copy of Adobe Flash Player to be installed. We had to use another utility to remove the AdWind malware. 

Covers: macOS

The thing about CleanMyMac is that it is a Mac Cleaner and optimizer first and an antivirus second, but the fact that CleanMyMac’s antivirus protection is built into the suite of tools makes it worth assessing as an antivirus solution. The question is whether if you use CleanMyMac for it’s primary purpose, will it also protect you from malware?

Looking at CleanMyMac as an antivirus tool, we found that the software offers a good level of customization, and it’s easy to choose between the three scan modes (Quick Scan, Balanced Scan, and Deep Scan), each of them offering quick performance as CleanMyMac scans your hard drive and external drives. It’s also easy to configure scan behaviors, such as whether or not to include external drives in your scans or target .DMG files, and whitelists can also be created to exclude specific volumes and folders from the scans.

In our tests results were mixed though. The software teamed up well with macOS’ GateKeeper feature, stopping questionable software that hasn’t been signed as safe by Apple from being installed, but it was still possible to get a fair amount of malware past these systems and on to our Mac.

The Quick Scan feature caught two elements from CrossRat and a threat in the form of the infamous AdWind malware. The Balanced Scan function was able to root out most of the Elite Keylogger malware. The Deep Scan feature found the remnants of the AdWind malware, but we had to dig that out with a third-party utility.

CleanMyMac was able to catch some elements of malware as they were being opened for the first time, but there were questionable chunks of software that remained even after they’d purportedly been removed and the Mac had been rebooted.

CleanMyMac also offered no tangible warning against visiting questionable websites and allowed us to click on every questionable link to be found in Gmail’s Spam folder without warning.

The interface is excellent, and MacPaw makes good use of its potentially great MoonLock antiviral engine to catch a fair amount of viral activity, but it still left adware and malware behind.

Covers: macOS

Malwarebytes Premium Security for Mac offers antiviral, VPN, and Real-Time Protection features and is available at $3.75/£2.50 a month for its Basic version, $5.00/£4.15 a month for its Security + VPN version, and $7.92/ £6.25 a Month (down from $15.83/£12.50 a month) for its Complete Protection version. There is also a free antivirus from Malwarebytes which we look at here: Malwarebytes Free Antivirus Review.

Malwarebytes Premium builds on the free version of Malwarebytes, which is reasonably good at hunting down and removing some of the peskiest viruses and malware, but was thwart with bugs and crashes when we tested it.

The paid-for version sports a bright, friendly user interface and a good array of features. It includes quick viral scans, functional scheduling for scans, decent customization elements including whitelist creation, a good VPN client, and Real-Time protection that keeps an eye on what’s attempting to be installed.

The software performed well, offering speedy scans. Malwarebytes was able to quarantine and remove almost all the malware I installed, although it left elements behind such as the controversial Wave web browser, an incompatible version of MacSecurity, and a fake Adobe Album application.

The VPN isn’t as customizable as a dedicated VPN client, but it performs well and gets the job done. See our review of the Malwarebytes VPN.

There doesn’t seem to be a custom scan element that allows you to easily scan an external volume such as a thumb drive, and the Real-Time Protection feature doesn’t kick in and scan an external volume once it’s mounted, nor can you drag and drop a volume into Malwarebytes for it to scan – which you can do in the Windows version of Malwarebytes. Malwarebytes offers no warnings against questionable websites and links either. 

Covers: macOS

Installing ClamXAV from the ClamXAV website is quick and easy. The installation file is automatically downloaded. After the initial setup, where you need to grant permission to access the Downloads folder and modify security settings, you are all set.

You can run a manual scan from the main screen, but there are several other options. A quick scan checks system files and other areas on your Mac, you can select just your hard drive to run a scan on all folders and files on the disk, and dragging and dropping a single folder or file onto the scanning pane checks it for malware. You can also select an external drive or connected USB stick for scanning. There’s also a real-time scanning component–Sentry–that is always on guard.

It is possible to schedule any type of scan to run on specific days and times. By default, any malicious files are automatically quarantined, but you can decide whether or not to quarantine infected files. You can open the quarantine folder to see what files were caught.

ClamXAV proved effective at detecting and stopping test malware files, but there’s nothing more to the program beyond the basic antivirus scanning and options. ClamXAV is certainly effective at virus scanning, but that’s a capability found in many free and equally effective security products for the Mac.

• AV Test, September 2023: 100%

Covers: macOS

F-Secure Total for Mac is a simple-to-use security software suite that works on macOS, iOS, Windows and Android devices and protects your data from a wide range of threats. It includes several useful features, but lacks certain key options, especially in virus scanning.

The program is $69.99/£59.99 a year for one device, which is steep, but there’s a free 30-day trial that requires no credit card and even gives you free technical support if you need it.

Clicking the Scan button runs a full virus scan that checks your entire system, while clicking the link for Viruses & Threats takes you to another screen where you can scan just specific folders. But there are no options to run a quick scan or even to schedule a scan, unlike the Windows version which includes a quick scan. It provides real-time virus and spyware scanning to automatically block malware, and ‘DeepGuard’ monitors applications for any changes indicative of a malware infection.

You can set up ID monitoring to check your email address for data breaches among your online accounts. The VPN is another defense and includes tracking protection to prevent advertisers from monitoring your online activity and a kill switch to quickly cut off all internet traffic.

F-Secure offers a password vault that creates and stores secure logins for all your accounts. The password vault requires an extension that supports Chrome, Firefox, and Edge. Safari isn’t yet supported.

Unfortunately, F-Secure doesn’t let you review blocked or deleted malicious files, and no setting allows you to quarantine files instead of removing them.

F-Secure’s Safe (which was the old name for F-Secure Internet Security) was tested by AV-Test in June 2023 and scored 5 out of 6 for protection, 5.5 out of 6 for performance and 6 for usability.

• AV Test, December 2024: 100%

Covers: macOS, Windows and Android

ESET Home Security (available in Essential, Premium and Ultimate configurations) is developed by Slovakian software company ESET. The suite will protect your Macs (as well as PCs, and other smartphones and tablets, but unfortunately not iOS). We tested ESET Home Security Premium, which offers extensive antiviral and malware protection, and Real-time File System Protection, as well as a password manager, an encryption tool – although it turned out the latter two were missing from the version we reviewed, which appears to be an error.

The software can be downloaded from ESET’s website. There is a 30-day trial available with only an email address and no credit or debit card needed. ESET Home can also be found on the U.S. version of the Mac App Store, but the download doesn’t actually work.

ESET Home Security Premium retails at different price points given the number of devices it’s installed on and the number of years you subscribe for. It’s usually $59.99/£44.99 for one device for one year, scaling up from there, but there are discounts from time to time which can be seen on the ESET website.

The application allows for changes such as blacklists and whitelists to be created, different levels of detection and sensitivity, access to the logs and proxy servers, reactions as to new volumes being mounted, and an impressive level of customization.

Scheduled scans can be set up easily, and it’s fairly simple to designate which areas of a local or cloud-based drive will be scanned and when. In our tests ESET’s initial scan was able to locate and quarantine 18 suspect files without incident.

However, issues within the software included: extremely long scan times ranging from seven to more than 24 hours to look over an internal solid-state drive, the scheduler feature failing to activate a scan, a lack of a progress bar or elapsed time readout during a scan, the software’s uninstall feature failing to install multiple times, and our copy of the ESET Home Security Premium software arriving without the advertised password manager or encryption features.

While ESET Home Security Premium completes its primary task of antiviral and malware prevention, several bugs and omissions need to be fixed.