which is the best antivirus for a mac?

The best anti virus for your MAC is your MAC OS.

There are no known viruses for MAC. Trojans and malware are not viruses.

To give you a sense of security, you can download ClamX AV and run it once a week if you wish.

Other than that, follow the safe browsing rules so you won't have to worry about viruses, trojans and malwares.

oo now i understand, no virus at all!! but trojans, maleware, worms etc..

so i change my question: is there something to keep safe mac from them?

As Bimmer said, your system itself, plus your own mind, once it has been educated. That is all that is required. See my Mac Malware Guide for more information.

If, after reading that, you still want AV software, either ClamXav or Sophos Anti-Virus for Mac Home Edition are good, and are also both free.

The chances of you getting any are slim to none.

Again, download ClamX AV and use it once a week to scan for any. You will see that after the scan, you won't have any either.

Now, if you're keen on having one, download Bitdefender from the App Store. It's a free download.

Works as good as ClamX AV if not better.

If you want something that you can purchase, then go with Bitdefender.

Better yet, follow Thomas A Reed's , link to learn more.

Now, if you're keen on having one, download Bitdefender from the App Store. It's a free download.

Works as good as ClamX AV if not better.

Not even remotely! I tested BitDefender not long ago, and it missed 20% of the malware in my collection. And most of the malware in my collection is less than 2 years old. BitDefender may be a respected name in the Windows world, but that detection rate makes it worthless in the Mac world.

ClamXav blows it out of the water.

Good point. Thomas.

Reason I included that was the new release of Bitdefender for MAC OS (free version) got good reviews.

The problem with trusting reviews of AV software, especially if they're from mainstream media, is that they don't often have much or any malware to test it with, so all they can judge it on is interface and features. But those are some of the least important aspects of AV software. How well it detects malware is the key!

Thomas.....

Need to pick your brains for a sec.

I have 2 macbooks, 3 once i get my retina version.

late 08 MB Uni running Lion which I use when I travel and have ClamX AV.

a 1 month old late 2011 13' MBP which I use for my line of work running OSX Lion and a paid version of Bitdefender.

I log in to financial institutions and brokerage firms that requires me to have a full time antivirus running in the background, hence the purchase of bitdefender. I had good experience with them since i have them running in both my PC notebook.

Here's my dilema, I don't really like running any anti virus on my soon to come Retina but it's required by the banks and brokerage firms I log in to.

How do I bypass that?

You could always try telling them that Mac OS X includes its own built-in anti-malware software. That argument will have more weight behind it in a month in Mountain Lion, when that software becomes a bit more prominent, in the form of Gatekeeper.

Will do....Cheers......

I use sophos. It stays out of my way. I like to use it because at college I have to use Windows machines. I usually will save to a flashdrive, and then transfer the information to my Mac. The antivirus will remove any malware from the flashdrive, so I don't carry it(malware) from computer lab to computer lab.

Thomas,

I recently purchased my first mac, and felt the need to purchase an anti virus for it. I decided upon norton internet security. Even after being told that it was unnecessary I still installed it. It seemed to run fine, but was never really satisfied with the firewall portion of the product.I was happy with its antivirus portion and live updates, it seemed quite thorough. But after hearing so much trash talk about norton for mac, I decided to uninstall it. I with your advice to use Clamxav. The first scan with Clamxav went well, it seemed thorough and scanned for about 45 mins to an hour and found two Phishing files that norton had possibly missed. Today when i went to scan my computer again, it scanned for like a minute and a half. It did not seem to be performing properly. Anyways, confused and frustrated I called symantec, since i had paid good money for norton internet security and requested help. I wanted to know if I could just run their antivirus scanner w/o the norton firewall and they said yes. I wanted to make sure that in doing so just running the antivirus wouldnt affect my mac firewall, and they said it wouldnt affect my mac firewall. So I reinstalled Norton antivirus only with their help and a new product code for just the antivirus. Now im not sure how to properly uninstall Clamxav, I looked for a uninstall option but only found a remove to trash option via application folder which I did. Also im not sure if i should keep norton on my mac, even just as a virus scanner. I feel should get my money's worth but I dont want to mess up my new mac. Should I uninstall Norton and just use Clamxav or should i keep norton until it runs out? Clamxav seems good but i have no idea what it is actually scanning, and I do like the simplicity of the norton antivirus scanner and live updates. Is there any simpler cheap or possibly free virus scanner that you could recommed that work well with a mac. What should i do? The only third party application I use is Flash for watching documentaries on Youtube, and I hear that Flash can cause issues with a mac. I am not willing to part with Flash for the time being since I am not good with computers and it is simple to use which is a plus for me. Thank you and i apprectiate your advice. I hope my questions and concerns are clear enough for you.

if anybody tells you that you don't need antivirus software do NOT listen to them. i had a number of windows virus and malware running on my system and i had to flush them out with kaspersky. If anybody suggests using clamxav don't bother using it. It doesn't detect anything its complete junk. Get kaspersky along with virusbarrier express. you could also use avast since that is good also. Don't download mackeeper since that is malware in itself.

Windows virus running on a Mac? Well that's a bit of a stretch.