Kaspersky vs G DATA vs Bitdefender
In anticipation of my antivirus license renewal, I conducted a thorough evaluation of alternative solutions to my current Kaspersky installation. My assessment was significantly informed by the reputable and long-trusted independent testing conducted by av-comparatives.com. The March 2025 Malware Protection Test revealed that while Kaspersky excels with a 100% online protection rate, its malware detection capability lags behind leading competitors such as G DATA and Bitdefender. To validate these findings, I performed a comparative analysis of the three antivirus products' detection rates, leveraging their online/cloud detection mechanisms. The results corroborated the test data, with G DATA identifying the highest number of malware instances (19), followed by Bitdefender (16), and Kaspersky (7). This discrepancy raises a significant concern, as my current preference for Kaspersky is primarily driven by its minimal performance impact on my laptop. Consequently, I am faced with the critical decision of whether to prioritize a superior detection rate over maintaining optimal system performance.
While I initially considered switching antivirus solutions, I have elected to remain with Kaspersky for the following key reasons: * G DATA's Web Protection feature consistently generates ERR_SSL_PROTOCOL_ERROR errors for legitimate websites, including critical services like gmail.com, necessitating its deactivation for standard browsing. * Bitdefender lacks the crucial functionality to export and import settings configurations. This feature is essential for my workflow, given my practice of resetting my Windows environment monthly prior to applying Windows updates. Despite submitting a feature request for this functionality several years ago, it remains unavailable in Bitdefender, while both G DATA and Kaspersky offer this capability.
I hope Kaspersky can improve its detection rate significantly in near future.