How Often Should You Update Your Antivirus Software?

Antivirus software has become one of the tools that we use to protect our devices against malicious attacks. In fact, the 2025 Antivirus Statistics and Consumer Report indicated that 75% of people say that their software is highly effective in keeping them protected.

However, it happens all too often where we set it up and then completely forget about it. But the thing is, it’s only as effective as its last update. So if you can’t remember the last time that you updated it, you’re leaving your device wide open to threats.

This raises the question, how often does your antivirus software need updating?

 

What Does An Antivirus Protect Your Device From?

 

Antivirus software is designed to safeguard your device against a whole range of digital threats. There are common ones like viruses and trojans that can steal your data or damage files.

There are also more sophisticated threats such as ransomware where you are locked out of your device until you pay to get access or spyware which monitors the device to steal information.

Fortunately, antivirus software is equipped to identify all of these threats and remove them from your device.

 

Why Are Frequent Updates Necessary?

 

Cybercrime is not your run-of-the-mill job and that means hackers don’t take holidays or time off. In fact, they’re usually spending their days creating new types of malware that antivirus programmes aren’t familiar with yet.

In an effort to keep up with these new threats, antivirus companies constantly release updates with security patches and new detection techniques.

Since these updates happen frequently, if your antivirus is outdated, it won’t recognise new threats and they can freely wreak havoc on your device.

 

 

What Would Happen If You Don’t Update Your Antivirus?

 

Not updating your antivirus software is almost like locking your front door but leaving your windows wide open. You may think that you’re protected but in reality, you’re very much vulnerable to any threat coming your way.

When you skip updates, your device is not protected against zero-day attacks. These are new threats that are designed to exploit vulnerabilities in your software before your antivirus can patch it. But when your software is updated, it has a better chance of identifying them before they can do some serious damage.

Aside from the increased chance of being hacked, an outdated antivirus can actually affect your device’s performance. Over time, it will slow down the system and cause issues with other programmes.

 

How Often Should You Update It?

 

While “often as possible” is the short answer, it’s not very specific. Let’s get into a more detailed timeline of when your antivirus software should be updated.

 

Daily Updates Are Recommended

 

A lot of the modern antivirus programmes need to be checked for updates at least once a day. This is because in a case where new threats are constantly emerging, time matters and updating your software as quickly as possible will give you the best chance at protection.

Most of these softwares will have the option to automatically update so check to see that this is enabled. That way, you don’t need to remember every day to do it manually.

 

Manual Checks Once A Week

 

Even if you have enabled automatic updates, it doesn’t hurt to check it yourself at least once a week just in case.

This is to make sure that the updates are still happening regularly and that the software is in fact running. It’s also handy to check when your subscription needs to be renewed.

 

Major Software Updates

 

These are rolled out by antivirus companies every 3 to 6 months in addition to the smaller, daily updates.

Updates like these will usually include things like better detection engines, compatibility with new Microsoft or Apple updates and even upgrades to the programme’s interface.

When these major updates are available, you’ll usually get a notification about it so that you can update your system.

 

Are These Updates Applicable To Free Antivirus Software?

 

Some people choose to use free antivirus software to avoid paying for one and while they offer some protection, they can be quite limiting.

More specifically, some of these limitations are fewer available updates or they need to be done manually and there’s no automatic option.

It’s not to say that you can’t use a free antivirus but if you are, you need to be proactive. This means doing manual checks every day for updates and monitoring the update history to check you are using the up-to-date version.

However, if you want real-time protection and automatic updates then it’s definitely worth considering looking into a paid version.