See today's best Kaspersky antivirus prices
Every PC needs excellent virus protection, but that doesn't necessarily mean spending a lot of money on the latest general-purpose security suite. Kaspersky's consumer starter product is Kaspersky Anti-Virus, a simple package that focuses on security fundamentals: antivirus to detect known and new malware, and malicious URL filtering to keep you away from dangerous links. (There's a simple performance tuning too, but nothing you can't improve, for free, in tools like CCleaner.)
keep in mind
This is our all-in-one roundup that looks at every Kaspersky consumer security solution for 2021. On this page, after our brief introduction, you will find
(a) a full evaluation of entry-level Kaspersky Anti-Virus, as well as our reviews of additional features incorporated in the rest of the range:
(b) Kaspersky Internet Security and
(c) the high-end package of Kaspersky Total Security, and
(d) an overview of the benefits of the Kaspersky Security Cloud range
You can access reviews of these individual products by clicking the links in the bar at the top of this page, but please note that this article is intended to be read to the end, as the features of Kaspersky Anti-Virus they are too. present in higher-level security suites, of course.
At a steep discount, you get a one-year license of Kaspersky Anti-Virus for three devices for just € 30, which doubles to € 60 when renewed. Adding devices (Windows only) and years can improve value. For example, a three-year license for five devices costs € 120 for the first period, then € 240 when it is renewed.
- Subscription options for Kaspersky Anti-Virus:
- Kaspersky Anti-Virus for € 29,99 per year
This is a reasonable value and is within the range we would expect from a high security product, but look past the initial discount and you may get a better deal elsewhere. Bitdefender Antivirus Plus seems a bit more expensive at € 150 for its five-device, three-year license, for example, but it won't double the renewal, which could save you a lot of money in the long run.
Kaspersky Internet Security extends antivirus with a firewall, a secure browser to protect your online transactions, and protection against webcam hacking. The free version of the Kaspersky Safe Kids parental control system includes content blocking and screen time management, ad blocking and trackers to protect your privacy online, and there is a free 200MB per day version of Kaspersky VPN.
Choosing Kaspersky Internet Security also expands support for your platform, with applications for Mac and Android.
Like antivirus, Kaspersky Internet Security prices are the most competitive at the lowest tier, starting at € 40 (€ 80 when renewed) for a one-year license for three devices. A five-device, three-year license is less impressive: € 135 initially, € 270 on renewal. The equivalent Bitdefender Internet Security license is € 170.
High-end Kaspersky Total Security includes the full commercial version of Kaspersky Safe Kids, with extras, including GPS tracking, and adds a password manager for PC, Mac, and Android, as well as a Windows backup tool.
It's not the longest of feature lists, but the suite is only slightly more expensive than Internet Security at €50 (€100 on renewal) to cover five devices for a year, or €225 (€450 on renewal). ) to cover a family. - dimensioning 10 devices for a period of three years.
Kaspersky's Security Cloud range offers you the same features and more. Kaspersky's "adaptive protection" technology offers intelligent help when you need it, for example by warning you if a password you've chosen is too weak or offering to activate your VPN if you're connected to an unsecured network.
It is not the most compelling of the proposals, but the Security Cloud range has some strengths.
Bargain hunters will appreciate Security Cloud Free, which offers powerful free antivirus protection.
And while it only has a handful of additional features, the price is so close to Total Security that you may want to upgrade anyway. A one-year full security license for ten devices costs € 75 the first year, for example € 150 when renewed; The purchase of Kaspersky Total Security Family costs a little over € 90 the first year, but the same € 150 thereafter.
Kaspersky Anti-Virus
The Kaspersky installation process is simple, streamlined, and as fast as we've seen. The trial download links are clearly highlighted on the website and the installer is small. He asked us to accept the license agreement and automatically downloaded and configured the rest of the package.
We didn't have a license and we didn't give Kaspersky our email address, but the installer didn't care. All we had to do was press the "Activate trial license" link and our Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2021 setup was ready to use.
(The program showed a follow-up message asking us to connect our program to a My Kaspersky account, which allows us to see its status on the web. But that is not necessary, and if you are not interested, you can simply close the window and continue. using antivirus as usual).
Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2021 has kept your system footprint to a minimum, adding only four main services and four background processes to our settings (Bitdefender Anti-Virus Plus 2021 installed 13 in total).
We ran PCMark Professional before and after installing Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2021 to check for any performance impacts. The results were good, with Anti-Virus reducing our score by just 0,62%. It's a small improvement over Bitdefender Anti-Virus Plus 2021, which reduced our speeds by 0,95%, but nothing you would notice in the real world.
AV-Comparatives' most detailed performance test from October 2020 measures the performance impact of security products against a multitude of common system tasks: installing and running applications, browsing websites, downloading files, extracting content file, etc. It ranked Kaspersky fourth out of 17 for minimal performance hit, great result, and only F-Secure, K7, and McAfee did better. (Avast finished XNUMXth, Bitdefender XNUMXth, Avira XNUMXth, and surprisingly Microsoft Defender is last.)
Finally, we run our self-protection tests, where we check if security applications can be disabled by malware. Testing includes attempting to remove key application files, terminating or suspending processes, stopping services, uninstalling or disabling drivers, or disabling features by toggling settings in the registry or configuration files. We were able to shut down some non-critical processes, like Kaspersky's password manager, but the antivirus blocked everything we tried and our security was never compromised.
What's New?
Kaspersky Anti-Virus has been a leading security product for a long time, so it is probably not surprising that there are no major changes in version 2021. However, we did spot some interesting changes in the version. page.
The application has more and better organized settings, for example, including new performance options to reduce the impact of the system when running on battery power, if you are using a full screen application or if your processor or disk is working. they are subject to a heavy load.
A new Manage Settings option allows you to save your current settings and restore them later, perhaps useful as a backup or if you want to use the same settings on multiple computers.
File virus scans now check Microsoft Office files up to 8MB, giving them a better chance of detecting any threats. (It is not vulnerable if a file is larger; it will be scanned when accessed.)
Performance improvements include more efficient and reliable installations (the installer uses older versions of .NET when possible, rather than forcing you to download the latest version) and faster database updates.
Kaspersky has discontinued its Application Advisor, which used to display reputation data for executable files. However, you can still check the file's reputation from the Explorer context menu, so we don't see this as a major issue.
Some of Kaspersky's bonus tools have revamped their functionality. Previously, Windows vulnerability scanning and troubleshooting tools reported misconfigured Windows security settings, for example largely unnecessary because you were getting the same information from everyone. Now the vulnerability scan only checks for missing app updates, and the Windows troubleshooting scan handles all the system configuration checks - a much smarter approach.
Elsewhere, support for the old Microsoft Edge (pre-Chromium) is limited to scanning traffic, and the Kaspersky Protection browser extension is no longer supported for Internet Explorer.
So there are a few tweaks here and there in the 2021 release, and additional settings are welcome, but there is nothing here that will change your security life.
Antivirus
Kaspersky Anti-Virus has a simple interface that shows your current protection status (a reassuring green check mark, hopefully) and four main buttons to perform key tasks: run scans, update the database, view reports, or open a keyboard. onscreen.
The Scan panel allows you to run quick or full system scans, as well as check your external drives or the files and folders you specify. Users can also analyze selected items from the Explorer context menu.
Scan times were relatively quick, with antivirus taking 19 minutes 14 seconds for the first scan of our target files (209,000 of them, 50 GB in total), dropping to 2 minutes and 50 seconds during the second scan. For comparison, Bitdefender Anti-Virus Plus took a relatively long 39 minutes for the first run, although it dropped to 27 seconds for the second run.
A simple scheduler is available to automatically run any type of scan daily, weekday, weekend, weekly, or monthly. Smart configuration options allow the scan to be run again the next day if the computer is turned off while it is halfway through and you...