We also use a mix of scenarios on both Windows and macOS, including viruses stored on USB sticks, and even malicious real-world phishing webpages designed to steal your data.

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Do I Need To Buy Antivirus Mac Antivirus Software

But no computer is immune from cyber attacks, so each year we test Mac antivirus software to their limits with hundreds of virus attacks including worms and ransomware to see how they fare.

Our lab tests Windows antivirus software with several thousand Windows-specific viruses each year, but tests only a few dozen on Mac computers.

In short, its actually quite tricky to get infected by Malware on an Mac.

If you never had any intention of running the viruses yourself, you could inadvertently share them with somebody you know who might not be so fortunate.

Almost all the security suites we test come with additional protection against phishing attacks, where websites pretend to be legit in order to steal your data.

We have found that the very best Mac security suites will also bolster your phishing protection quite significantly, and perform better than the protection built into the Mac versions of Safari, Chrome, Firefox and Opera web browsers.

For this reason, if youre nervous about threats on the web, it would make sense to at least consider a Mac security suite.

And for everybody else, weve highlighted five options from the biggest brands.

Whats more, if you have Windows computers in your household you can mix and match the different device types under the same subscription.

Subscribing gets you various other benefits, although some, such as the 50GB of cloud storage, is only available for Windows computers.

See whether its worth paying for in our Norton Security Deluxe for Mac review.

Like Norton, you can mix and match a Kaspersky multi-device Internet Security subscription between Windows and Macs.

See if its worth the cost in our full Kaspersky Internet Security for Mac review.

There are no frills, but it should deliver when it comes to basic protection, adding that last layer of defence for when all else fails.

See how it fared in our antivirus lab test by reading the full AVG Antivirus for Mac review.

Included in the installation is Avasts free password manager, which might come in handy if youve yet to set one up for yourself.

Do I Need To Buy Antivirus Free Antivirus For

Read our full Avast Free Antivirus for Mac review to see whether its a good free choice.

It has set up dozens of computers in 40 countries around the world to act as honeypots for millions of viruses.

These honeypots capture viruses that are fresh into the wild and may have only existed for days.

This makes the task for the security software very challenging, because many of them rely upon huge databases of so-called virus definitions to tell whether or not a file is harmful.

Do I Need To Buy Antivirus For Mac