TotalAV Antivirus 2022 Review – Top Features, Pros & Cons

It’s no secret that antivirus software is necessary for every computer and every operating system that involves Internet surfing.

For many people, though, it’s more of a luxury than an absolute must — until one of their friends or family members falls victim to ransomware, spyware, or data loss.

Nobody wants to think about viruses or malware on their computer, but you may become a victim sooner or later if you don’t have a strong antivirus.

With many online threats hovering over us, investing in reliable antivirus software is safe. One of the popular antivirus programs available on the market is TotalAV Antivirus.

This software has been advertised as being one of the best security systems available on the market today. However, is this true? How much can Total AV software protect our systems from?

In this Total AV review, let’s take an in-depth look at its features, packages, benefits, and drawbacks!

Why TotalAV?

When you require a solution that single-handedly protects your system from malicious threats and keeps it optimized at its best performance, then TotalAV is the best choice.

TotalAV provides real-time antivirus protection against malicious software and allows you to protect your computer from unknown viruses and other types of malware. Unlike other programs, this one alerts you when a virus tries to infect your computer and will also clean up malicious files from your hard drive that viruses have infected.

TotalAV Antivirus offers complete virus removal and protection against malware through heuristic algorithms and proactive protection. This antivirus program will automatically keep itself updated with the latest definitions. So, you always have the most up-to-date protection possible against viruses, worms, Trojans, adware, spyware, and rootkits.

TotalAV provides a private firewall, which blocks all connections not initiated by an authorized application or process to prevent attacks by hackers and malware into your operating system through these back doors.

• High level of protection
• Simple interface
• Lightweight
• Compatible with all the recent Windows, Mac, Android, and iOS versions
• System optimization features
• Easy to install and use
• 30-day money-back guarantee

Malicious Threats TotalAV Can Protect You From

TotalAV software protects you from malicious threats that attempt to steal your personal information, including credit card information, login names, and passwords, by encrypting your connection to websites. It will scan every file downloaded or run on your computer, ensuring it is safe. It also keeps a watchful eye out for any applications behaving suspiciously.

Here are the network threats that TotalAV internet security can protect you from:

• Spyware: This program is designed to collect information from your computer and send it back to the creator of this spyware. If a spyware program is installed on your computer, it can monitor your activities, steal your personal information, or record your keystrokes.
• Adware: This program runs on your computer in the background and displays pop-up ads for questionable websites, and it might even install other programs without you knowing it.
• Trojans: This type of virus will take control of your computer without you even realizing it’s there. Trojans can cause severe damage by erasing files, stealing passwords, and recording keystrokes.
• Worms: This type of virus replicates itself throughout the network and into other computers causing multiple problems on any machine connected to a network. Worms can be tough to spot because they hide in various areas of your computer.
• Ransomware: prevents you from accessing your computer until you pay money to unlock it. Ransomware is distributed via emails from unknown senders and contains infected files or links, leading to dangerous sites.
• Injection Attacks: Injection attacks are prevalent in today’s world, where hackers try to inject their code into a website or software to execute their malicious code on the target computer later.

These are some common internet threats that we are vulnerable to every day. And TotalAV Antivirus protection can protect your systems from malicious threats by regularly monitoring your system files and browser interactions.

How Does TotalAV Antivirus Software Keep Your Systems Safe?

TotalAV Antivirus works very well to remove viruses from your computer and protect you from further attacks. It also offers a variety of other security features that protect you from different types of threats, such as malware, hackers, and identity thieves.

Extensive Threat Protection

TotalAV Antivirus has one of the most comprehensive antivirus & malware protection systems available today. This powerful yet easy-to-use software will protect your computer against all known and unknown viruses, spyware, and other malicious programs. The program has a built-in firewall, pop-up blocker, anti-spyware component, and an intuitive user interface that is easy to install and use.

Safe Browsing Experience

There have been many incidents where shopping websites have served as an avenue for stealing personal credentials. TotalAV ensures a safe online shopping and browsing experience by checking every website for threats before displaying them in its built-in browser window. So you know that when you click on any link to shop anything online, you are going to a safe place that TotalAV has vetted.

Proactive Monitoring

TotalAV offers you proactive and continuous protection against malware, spyware, viruses, and other cyber threats. It detects and removes the most active viruses and spyware on the web before they infect your computer.

The program includes an advanced scan engine that scans your hard drives in-depth to detect any threat, including viruses, spyware, trojans, worms, and adware. By checking for rootkits, TotalAV software can ensure that no malicious code has been planted on your system, which could allow hackers access to your system at any time.

It also comes with a virus scan feature that automatically scans your computer for potential threats and a quarantine section where you can view any suspicious files in your system. You can also use this antivirus software to scan an external drive for viruses, clean your hard drive of unnecessary junk files, duplicate files, and manage other optimization issues.

Real-Time Security

TotalAV offers a real-time protection feature that monitors all incoming and outgoing connections for malicious activities and blocks them immediately to prevent further damage to the system.

This software’s real-time antivirus protection feature monitors all active processes on your computer for any malicious behavior and deletes or alerts you if it finds anything suspicious.

The heuristic scanning technology can also detect unknown threats by learning how they act and what they look like to identify them when they appear at some point in the future.

Quick Threat Resolution

Even when you suspect malware or a virus in your system, you never know where they are or how to get rid of them. And trying to troubleshoot the problem yourself is often very hard and risky, especially if you are unsure what type of infection you are dealing with. That is where TotalAV comes in handy.

TotalAV detects the malware on your system and gives you multiple options to resolve them. It can scan your PC in minutes and detect almost all threats. Each threat it sees appears in a list with detailed information regarding its location and type. You choose the items you want to delete and click on the Remove, Quarantine, Whitelist, or Skip option.

Privacy Controls

TotalAV Antivirus has a privacy manager to help you control the cookies and other website tracking tools to watch your online activity. It offers complete privacy protection by allowing you to erase browsing history, clear cookies, block pop-ups and disable autorun functionality on external devices.

Further, TotalAV also helps protect your identity from getting stolen on the Internet. It also allows you to exercise your privacy by enabling ad blocks and using password vaults to keep your credentials safe.

Installation of TotalAV Antivirus Software

It’s straightforward to install TotalAV on your system.

• Directly download the software to your system from the official TotalAV website.
• Once you’ve downloaded it, you’ll be asked to run the program to install it, which takes not more than 2 minutes.

• The TotalAV dashboard automatically opens up once the installation is completed.

• You can now view various features of TotalAV. The first thing to do after installing TotalAV is to run an intelligent scan to identify any threats already residing in the system.
• Further, you can check for data breaches and use the junk cleaner, duplicate finder, and other system tune-up features to optimize your system.
• If you plan to go for the paid package, you can directly upgrade the account from your application after downloading it.

Main Security Features

TotalAV Antivirus software comes with a firewall, anti-spyware, anti-rootkit, and other advanced features to effectively defend your computer against malware and protect your data simultaneously.

TotalAV mainly has two significant functions to provide you with the best protection possible.

• First, it’s responsible for scanning files on your computer to detect malware before it can do any damage.
• The second is for real-time protection and blocking any attempt to access your private information.

 TotalAV Antivirus software protects you from keyloggers, rootkits, viruses, trojans, worms, and much more by employing multiple layers of defense such as behavioral monitoring, proactive threat detection, and behavior block technology with various features like:

WebShield

TotalAV’s WebShield protects your computer from any malicious website that tries to infect it with viruses, malware, spyware, or other harmful software.

This feature provides multi-level protection to your device by scanning all incoming and outgoing internet traffic, ensuring that no malware can enter or leave your computer through this medium. Once you enable WebShield, it will check all the websites you access and ensure they’re safe. If not, you’ll be warned before you can enter that site.

It also prevents the malware on your computer from communicating over any internet connection and thus ensures that they cannot communicate with their servers.

VPN

The most exciting feature provided by TotalAV is its ability to provide security while browsing the web and performing online transactions such as e-commerce shopping, online banking, social networking, etc., all over the world through a virtual private network (VPN).

TotalAV VPN service provides a layer of security for your online activities. It creates an encrypted tunnel between your device and a remote server to protect your identity while surfing the Internet at public locations or Wi-Fi hotspots.

The VPN encrypts your incoming and outgoing data and changes your IP address while connected to the Internet through public networks or hotspots. This feature helps you avoid being spied on by other users on the same Wi-Fi network and makes it virtually impossible for hackers to snoop on your Internet connection.

Firewall

TotalAV Antivirus firewall protects you from malicious files by blocking them from accessing your system. The firewall protects your computer from unauthorized internet connection through the network ports. It works against hostile environments and allows only known programs to access the computer. This feature stops hackers from using backdoors to gain access to your computer.

Data Breach

We often never know when our data gets stolen or our accounts breached.

TotalAV has a specific Data Breach feature that helps find the email addresses that are possibly stolen. It’s a simple but effective feature that warns us about the possible breach of our email addresses and advises us to make them more secure.

All you need to do is enter your email addresses, and in a few seconds, you’ll get a list of websites with your email addresses that have been breached. It also lists the number of associated email accounts that have been breached.

This is a helpful feature to keep our passwords updated and keep ourselves abreast of any possible breaches.

Malware Protection & Scanning

Malware can be viruses, spyware, trojans, or ransomware that stays on your system, steals your data, or initiates actions on your behalf.

TotalAV offers a one-click antivirus smart scan to detect and remove any present malware. It can also create bootable media for restoring the system and doing a full computer scan in case it gets infected.

You can perform two types of malware scans: a quick scan of the critical sections of the system or a complete system scan.

Running scans with TotalAV is fast and easy.

• When you first run the full or quick system scan, you can see the progress in the main interface. It has a clean internet security interface that’s easy to read.
• As the scan progresses, you can see the number of files (like duplicate files), folders scanned, and the number of threats detected.
• After scanning your files, you can see the complete scan results.

• You can choose which files you want to delete, quarantine, or keep. If you think a file is harmless, you can whitelist it, and TotalAV won’t show it as a threat.

One of our favorite things about TotalAV is that it provides helpful information about each item in a clean and well-organized interface. The description field is pretty accurate, so you know why some files were found suspicious and which ones are safe.

If you don’t have the time to run a full scan, you can do a quick scan where the software only checks the important system folders. Apart from the malware threats identified on your system, the scan results will also provide various recommendations for managing your data, junk files, cookies, and other security features.

Identity Threat Defense

Identity theft is a rising concern for many around the world. From our credit card details being stolen to our health insurance and bank details, it’s always better to be on the safer side. TotalAV offers identity theft protection for its users, which scans the online world in real-time for any possible leaks of your credentials.

In case of such thefts, you’ll be notified immediately to take action from your side. TotalAV also supports you in recovering and restoring your stolen identity and protects you from financial loss.

Other Features

While TotalAV Antivirus is a security suite that provides adequate protection for your PC, it also offers a complete range of optimization features like junk cleaner, duplicate finder, and uninstaller.

Junk Cleaner

TotalAV Antivirus has an advanced junk cleaner tool to scan your computer for unnecessary junk files and programs that take up hard drive space or memory. The junk cleaner lets you identify the items you want to keep or remove with a mouse click.

The junk cleaner deletes temporary internet files, cookies, history, log files, browser cache, system logs, invalid registry entries, and other junk files on your computer.

Duplicate File Finder

TotalAV Antivirus also has a duplicate file finder feature that allows users to scan their computers for duplicate files. This can be useful if trying to save space on your hard drive and remove duplicates. The application will allow you to view a list of all the copies found and delete whichever ones you want.

It also identifies files with the same name or similar content on your hard drive and lets you delete them en masse with a single click to free up disk space.

Uninstaller

You can uninstall any program with TotalAV’s uninstaller tool. This feature can uninstall programs corrupted or infected by spyware or viruses. The uninstaller has a list of all the programs on your computer so you can remove programs from your PC safely by letting you remove any traces left behind after an uninstallation attempt goes awry.

Browser Cleaner

The browser cleaner feature cleans up your browser from various types of cookies. It also provides one-click cleaning of all browsers, including Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer and other similar browsers.

Password Vault

Many of us have started using password managers and password vaults to secure our passwords. TotalAV offers an in-built password vault where you can store your passwords, and it can generate highly secure and unique passwords and save them for you in a secure vault. Further, you can also integrate the password vault browser extension to enable auto-fill-in for passwords.

AdBlock

We have all been faced with annoying ads cropping up often. TotalAV’s AdBlock feature blocks any unwanted ads, which helps us with uninterrupted browsing. We can, of course, whitelist a few websites whenever we need and optimize the AdBlock extension.

What Are the Pros & Cons of TotalAV?

Pros

TotalAV has many powerful features that can defend your system from malicious attacks. It’s a straightforward and effective software that uses multiple layers of protection to keep the system safe. Here are a few of the top reasons why many recommend TotalAV Antivirus.

No Expertise Needed

Using TotalAV for scanning and keeping your system safe doesn’t require any technical expertise. All you need to do is install the software and run scans on your computer with a single click.

This security suite is designed for users with little or no prior computer experience. It provides a comprehensive user interface that makes all its features easily accessible.

Simple & User-Centric Interface

The Total AV interface is simple and easy to navigate. A clean interface gives you access to all the controls you need to scan your system for malware and fix any issues.

You can use this software to scan an entire hard drive or a specific folder that you want to check for viruses. You can run a scan automatically each time it loads up or manually initiate antivirus scans whenever you want to check for problems.

Easy on the Memory Consumption

One of the common problems many faces with antivirus software is space consumption and its impact on PC performance.

But TotalAV Antivirus is very lightweight, so there will be no impact on the functioning of your device while installing this antivirus application.

It does not take up a lot of system resources, so you can use it without worrying about slowing down your computer. It runs in the background to protect you against viruses and malicious attacks.

Compared to many other antivirus programs, it consumes less memory space on the device so that you can quickly and smoothly access all apps without any interruption or any other issue related to the performance of your device.

One-Click Installer

TotalAV has an easy one-click installation process to make it convenient for users to protect their PCs against malware attacks.

It’s easy to install on your computer and user-friendly to understand how to manage it quickly. You have to download this antivirus software and install it on your system. After installing and enabling it in your system, you need not take additional steps to protect your computer from threats because it will automatically save your computer when you start your system.

TotalAV automatically updates itself to ensure that users are always protected against new threats.

Quick Space Optimization

No matter what kind of files you’re trying to store, it can find them. This means that if your hard drive is running out of space but you don’t know where the problem is coming from, TotalAV can help you clear out the clutter using its smart scan. If something has been broken or corrupted, it will help eliminate that problem.

Cons

While there are many pros associated with TotalAV Antivirus, there are also some cons that you’ll want to be aware of before deciding if this program is suitable for your computer.

No Real-Time Antivirus Security in Free Package

First off, even though TotalAV has a free antivirus version, you must remember that not all features in the paid version are available in the free version. There is no real-time protection in the free edition of TotalAV software, which means your broken and corrupted threats are detected only when you run the system scan.

Longer Time to Complete Full System Scan

While the intelligent scan only scans certain essential sections of the system, we must run full scans regularly. But the entire scan can take anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour or more based on the hard disk space and usage, which is a significant con when you want to get the scan done quickly.

Password Vault Only in Premium Add-On Package

While the password vault seems a desirable and valuable feature, it’s only available in the paid version. If you have a free antivirus version, you’ll need to upgrade to a paid plan and add the Password Vault feature.

What are the System Requirements for TotalAV Antivirus?

TotalAV Antivirus can work on Mac, Windows, Android, and iOS with specific functionalities designed for individual OS. For the TotalAV review, we installed and checked the application on all four types of devices and found the features optimized based on the OS.

TotalAV for Windows 

TotalAV antivirus is compatible with Microsoft Windows 7 SP1 or higher. For TotalAV to work on your laptops and desktops, your system should have 2GB of RAM and a minimum of 1.5GB of free disk space.

TotalAV Antivirus scans all your online interactions and ensures that you aren’t becoming victims of phishing or malware attacks, from the files you download to the shopping sites you visit on your Windows system.

TotalAV for Mac

There was a time when Mac didn’t require antivirus software due to its heightened in-built protection. But now, new malware has been developed exclusively to hack into Mac laptops that can threaten your system security.

You can install the TotalAV antivirus on your Mac laptop to regularly scan your system, identify the malware, and do away with them. You can extend the scanning to your cloud storage and ensure no virus has trickled into it.

You can install TotalAV on Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks or higher.

TotalAV for iOS

While iOS provides a good deal of protection from traditional online threats, there are still many malware threats that you need to keep away from. TotalAV ensures you don’t inadvertently leak your personal data onto the Internet through phishing attacks or malicious sites.

The WebShield feature of the TotalAV app monitors your browsing activity and warns you when accessing harmful sites that can steal your data. This works on iPhones and iPads of iOS 9.0 and above.

TotalAV for Android

You can use the TotalAV app on mobile devices like an Android smartphone if it’s version 5.0 and above. With this single app, you can use a VPN on the go, enable protected browsing and ensure that any downloaded files from the system aren’t making your smartphone vulnerable.

How Much Does TotalAV Cost?

While there’s a free version of TotalAV, it offers only a limited level of real-time protection. So if you want to enable real-time monitoring of your entire system, you need to go for any of these three pricing models.

TotalAV Antivirus Pro ($99)

This is the basic paid package available that offers protection against most malicious threats.

While it has all the necessary scanning and real-time protection features, it doesn’t have a few features like VPN, AdBlock, and Password Vault.

With this package, you only need to pay $99 for a whole year and use this software on three devices.

TotalAV Internet Security ($119)

This is the median paid package with all of the features of the Antivirus Pro and safe VPN browsing. The additional advantage is that you can use TotalAV with five devices at $119 per year with this package.

TotalAV Total Security ($149)

This is the comprehensive security protection package. It has all of the features offered by TotalAV, including the VPN, Password Vault, and AdBlock. TotalAV Total Security package costs $149 annually and can be used for six devices.

Which is the best package for you?

Since TotalAV can be used on Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android, the number of systems is the first and most crucial thing to consider. If you have a Windows laptop, 2 iOS phones, and an Android home, the basic TotalAV Antivirus Pro is a good option. But if you require VPN browsing abilities, you must go for the following package — TotalAV Internet Security.

While TotalAV cost can significantly influence your decision, choose a package with the complete protection you require. For businesses with many devices and multiple people handling the systems, it’s often best to go for the TotalAV Complete Security package to ensure no room for malicious threats.

Also, TotalAV offers a 30-day money-back guarantee for yearly packages and a 14-day money-back guarantee for monthly packages if you aren’t satisfied with its performance. So

Is TotalAV safe to use?

Yes, TotalAV Antivirus security is completely safe and secure to use. Since it uses advanced technologies and gets regularly tested by AV-TEST, the top industry accreditation, it’s safe to say that TotalAV is reliable software.

TotalAV has registered high scores in the AV-TEST regarding Protection, Performance, and Usability, indicating its extreme security and privacy controls.

For whom is TotalAV best?

If you’re looking for cost-effective antivirus software, TotalAV is what you need. Since it also has a free plan, you can always test the software before investing.

TotalAV is the most-suited solution for you if:

• You want to protect yourself against online attacks
• You want complete system security software at affordable rates
• You want a reliable, non-intrusive system to monitor your system constantly
• You don’t have the technical knowledge to dig deep to find the root cause of the threats
• You require a user-friendly application that’s quite simple to use
• You want an all-in-one security + system optimization solution
• You want to get complete value for the money spent with a simple, single solution
• You require software that gets regularly updated to protect against recent threats.

Our TotalAV Antivirus Review.

TotalAV is a cost-effective antivirus designed for internet users to protect their systems from any malicious threats. Several antivirus programs exist, but only a few work effectively.

TotalAV combines an excellent antivirus with a speed-boosting tool to enjoy the best of both worlds – maximum security and optimum overall performance.

So it’s an intelligent choice if you want a good antivirus program that doesn’t feel heavy on your pocket or your system and has multi-functional features.

Frequently Asked Questions