ClamWin Antivirus Review 2024: Is It Worth Using?

ClamWin is a free open-source antivirus that’s been receiving updates since 2003. Its malware detection ratings are quite good, and it supports old operating systems like Windows 7 that most competitors have long ago abandoned.

That said, it’s far from being a comprehensive security suite. ClamWin only provides an on-demand malware scanner. It lacks real-time malware protection, a firewall, web protection, a VPN, or anything else top antivirus suites come with.

It’s great if you need a simple malware scan, but it simply doesn’t offer broad protection. There are many better options out there. Norton, for example, comes with every feature I mentioned above and more. Though it isn’t free, it does come with a 60-day money-back guarantee.

ClamWin Full Review

Free and open-source, ClamWin is a good basic security tool. The scanner is effective at detecting malware. I was impressed to see that it gets virus definition updates every day, so it can identify the latest cybersecurity threats.

The problem is that it doesn’t offer any additional security. Most importantly, it lacks real-time protection. This means that it won’t stop you from getting malware. It’ll catch most threats when you run a scan, but it doesn’t offer any proactive defenses. Web protection is also absent, so there’s nothing to block dangerous websites.

ClamWin works as a basic tool to protect your PC from malware, but you can’t really compare it to fully fledged antivirus suites like Norton and Bitdefender.

ClamWin Security Features

ClamWin provides a free open-source malware scanner. It’s pretty good and has a lot of depth to it, but it can feel pretty clunky. The largest drawback to ClamWin is the lack of real-time protection or additional security features.

Starting with the positives, ClamWin uses ClamAVs’s malware engine. ClamAV has a solid history of producing security software for various platforms, but it’s most well known for being one of the top free Linux cybersecurity suites. Despite being more than 20 years old and completely free, ClamWin still receives daily updates to its database of virus definitions.

The scanner performed very well in my tests. I downloaded a range of malware samples onto my test PC. When I ran a scan, ClamWin caught and destroyed more threats than Windows Defender (the built-in Windows antivirus). That said, it fell shy of the perfect 100% detection ratings that most of my favorite antiviruses provide. Even when I ran a custom scan on a folder that I knew contained malware, it still missed a virus.

On the plus side, the scanner is very customizable. Open the Preferences page, and you’ll find tons of options to fine-tune ClamWin to your liking. You can whitelist or blacklist specific file extensions, move the folders containing ClamWin and its virus definitions, customize quarantine folders, and more. You can also schedule scans, though you can’t schedule a scan for multiple drives at once (my workaround was setting scans for each of my drives right after each other).

Despite having a few strong points, there are some obvious drawbacks. Running a full scan is strangely unintuitive. The home page presents a list of your drives and even explains the process for selecting multiple folders, but there’s no full scan button. You need to hold the shift key and double-click every drive. And even this was finicky; it randomly deselected drives and folders during my tests.

I’m sure this was a bug that I was experiencing, but even after reinstalling ClamWin, I couldn’t select multiple folders properly.

The scans are also quite slow. My first full scan took nearly 3 hours. It didn’t slow down my laptop or hog too many system resources, but the wait was still agonizing. For a point of comparison, Norton’s first scan took just 40 minutes with subsequent scans going much faster.

I’m also not a fan of how ClamWin handles the quarantining process. When it finds a virus, it flags it with a .infected extension and prevents you from opening it. You’re then given options to set up a folder for quarantined files. Antiviruses like TotalAV automatically place malware into quarantine folders and provide built-in tools to delete the malware on the spot.

Finally, ClamWin’s scanner has a few extra features, but they don’t amount to much. It can scan email attachments for malware and you can use it to set up proxy connections. But honestly I think it’s easier to set up a proxy using the native Windows interface.

Basically, ClamWin is pretty disappointing when it comes to features, especially when you consider the lack of real-time protection. The simple fact is that there are better free Windows antiviruses out there. Panda Dome’s free plan, for example, comes with both real-time protection and a VPN.

Overall, ClamWin’s malware scanner has rich customization options and an effective scanner. Unfortunately, it’s held back by poor design choices and a lack of features. Running a full scan is strangely inconvenient, I experienced frequent bugs with the app, and the quarantine process is years behind its competition. All that said, it’s free and does the job of detecting viruses very well.

ClamWin Plans & Pricing

ClamWin only offers a single free plan that includes all of its features. The program is entirely open-source and uses the ClamAV malware database, which has a long history and a good record.

You can use ClamWin on as many computers as you’d like. Unlike many free antiviruses, you don’t even need to make an account or provide an email to use it.

ClamWin Ease of Use & Setup

ClamWin is easy to set up but a bit trickier to use. To install it, just visit the website and download the program. Since it’s free and doesn’t require an account, there’s nothing more to it.

ClamWin’s UI certainly shows its age. The app itself looks very outdated and is at times frustrating to use. There’s no obvious way to perform a full computer scan. It just shows a list of available folders and drives to scan, but I was only able to scan one of my drives at a time. Whenever I’d try to highlight everything to do a true full scan, it would unhighlight other folders or drives seemingly at random. Considering that every decent antivirus makes running a full scan as simple as clicking a button, this is odd.

ClamWin earns back some points by having a ton of customization options. For example, you can set the scanner to give you email alerts when it finds a virus, set up scheduled scans, and even control finer aspects like extension filters.

ClamWin Customer Support

ClamWin has virtually nothing in the way of support. There’s no chatbot, phone support, nor even an email address you can contact should you have questions. This makes sense since the product is open-source and generates no revenue. Even so, many free antiviruses have extensive knowledge bases, FAQs, or forums.

I tried to visit the support page linked on the main website but, well, I ran into some problems.

Clicking the Forum button on the site’s sidebar led to an error. So I tried to click Support instead. That actually worked, but all I saw was a short bit of text and another link to the same dead page.

I tried using another browser, a different device, and even a VPN. Nothing worked. Perhaps this is only a temporary outage, but I tried to visit it over the course of several days and never had any luck.

Needless to say, this was disappointing. There is an FAQ, but all of the questions are fairly general. A couple questions referred to a bundled toolbar which wasn’t actually included when I downloaded the app.

I don’t expect free products to have great support, but the lack of a knowledge base and forum is unfortunate. Even the free version of Bitdefender comes with access to multiple customer support avenues.

Is ClamWin Worth Downloading?

Yes, but only if you’re aware of its drawbacks. ClamWin has excellent malware detection capabilities, but the lack of real-time protection is a serious problem. This means that ClamAV only works as often as you run scans. It can treat most infections, but it won’t stop malware from getting on your machine in the first place. To be fair though, it does what it advertises well and it’s free — but the limitations make it far less desirable than any of my favorite free antiviruses.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is ClamWin free?

Yes! ClamWin is completely free. There are no hidden paywalls, subscriptions, or even advertisements for other products in the app. ClamWin is one of the rare products that’s truly free.

Does ClamWin update its virus database?

ClamWin updates its virus definitions daily, meaning it stays up-to-date in terms of malware detection. The antivirus itself doesn’t see frequent large updates though. The app has only seen minor graphical updates or new features over the past decade. This isn’t necessarily bad, but based on the problems I experienced with the scanner, I see it as a drawback.

Should I install ClamWin?

It won’t hurt you to install ClamWin. ClamWin only advertises itself as a free on-demand malware scanner backed by the ClamAV database, and it’s pretty good at malware detection. However, it doesn’t include most of the features you need to stay safe online. It lacks real-time protection, a firewall, web protection, or any other bells-and-whistles included in any of my top antiviruses.