How to uninstall Avast from your computer is no big deal but you should know about it. An integral part of any Windows operating system is antivirus protection. Since the days of distant Windows XP, the essence has remained the same – to use third-party software (software) to protect your system from all sorts of malicious programs. Windows 10 offers a little more modern solution today – built-in Windows Defender ( Defender), which is finally quite good at coping with threats of all kinds.
Unfortunately or fortunately, this method of protection has not gained much popularity among users, and in an old-fashioned way, we all resort to using some or other means of third-party software. Users choose from all these simple solutions – so as not to “steam” with keys and licenses of Kaspersky, NOD32, and other antivirus programs, and are more inclined to choose free products. One of the most popular of them has long been and remains Avast Free Antivirus. There are no problems with him listed above and the protection is more or less acceptable. But still, there are no ideal solutions, and even such a product sometimes has to be removed. It is probably not worth finding out the reasons, but the methods for removing Avast themselves can be analyzed in more detail.
Preparing How to uninstall Avast
The fact is that Avast uses a special self-defense module that prevents the computer from fully eliminating its existence. First, you need to turn it off. The first thing to do is, of course, open the Avast antivirus. Then find the gear icon and click on it. In the current settings window, there should be a tab “Troubleshooting” – find and go. In the list of checkboxes that appear, remove the checkbox from “Enable Avast self-defense module”. The antivirus will start to “swear” that a potential threat has appeared, but everything is going according to plan.
The official Avastclear utility for How to uninstall Avast
It is quite logical that if there is a method provided by the developer himself, then it is better to use it. By the way, this method is also not ideal, but more on that later. The developers have foreseen the case when users still want to get rid of this application, and have developed a utility for the safest and fastest removal of Avast. It is called quite logically – Avastclear and can be used exclusively to remove this antivirus, nothing more, nothing less. You can find and download it on the developer’s website, it does not require any registrations and other “priblud”. It is best to run it in Windows Safe Mode, since the program may be active during normal startup.
In the window that opens, everything is very clear – the program location directory, the installed version, and, in fact, the “Delete” button.
After clicking the button, a warning window will appear, in which you need to confirm your intention to remove the antivirus. Next, the standard uninstallation process will begin, To complete the procedure, you need to reboot the PC.
Windows standard way to uninstall programs
Nobody canceled the usual time-tested method of uninstalling – through the “Programs and Features” Windows 10. Why not? After this method, Avast Free Antivirus will also permanently leave RAM, running processes and startup.
It’s a pity, but even after running the proprietary Clear application and the uninstaller in Windows, there is a high probability that the remnants of the program will still hang in the system. And although this will not affect the consumption of RAM and the processor load, some people will still have an unpleasant aftertaste. For such perfectionists, further action is intended.
Avast leftovers and methods of cleaning them
We are mainly interested in the Windows registry. It is there that all the “tails” of once deleted programs remain. You need to understand that games with the Registry Editor sometimes do not lead to good, so everything described below is at your own peril and risk. You can find this very editor by entering the “Regedit” command in the search box in Start. Do not touch anything here yet, just call the key combination “Ctrl + F” in the active window. This is a standard combination for many applications (mainly all kinds of text and image editors) for the search menu to appear.
What should I enter? Avast, of course. And then it’s a matter of technology. We delete one by all keys with this name. You can also manually go through the directories on your hard drive where the antivirus was installed and remove them completely.
Third-party programs to uninstall Avast
Not all of us uninstall programs of interest to us (or rather, those that have ceased to interest us) using standard Windows tools through “Programs and Features”. Many have already had uninstallers at hand, created by outside developers. As a rule, their removal algorithms are slightly, and sometimes strikingly different from the standard ones built into the operating system.
Conclusion:
If we consider Avast antivirus among similar free solutions, this is a very high-quality and reliable product that is really able to protect against a large number of modern threats. No one bothers to install other software either – the choice is now wide, but instead of the remote antivirus, you must immediately install a new one, and not leave the computer unprotected. The main thing that you now know is that any antivirus software can be correctly and accurately removed without any consequences, including Avast.