Norton vs McAfee Statistics – Which Is Better? (2025)
Updated · Jun 23, 2025
Table of Contents
Introduction
Norton vs McAfee Statistics: In 2024, Norton and McAfee make up the two biggest names in consumer antivirus software. Norton—today part of Gen Digital—is said to be bringing in a magnificent USD 1.6 billion annually and accounts for 13% of the global antivirus market. McAfee, with its 600 million registered users and 9% annual growth in user base, maintains its solid cross-platform presence.
This article provides the Norton vs McAfee statistics regarding user base size, performance, and website traffic to get an overview of the state of Norton vs. McAfee in 2024.
Editor’s Choice
- Norton leads the premium antivirus market with 29% of paid users, while McAfee follows with 23% but has 19% of free users compared to Norton’s 6%, allowing it a wider reach among price-conscious customers.
- February 2025 found McAfee with a significantly higher number of website visitors than Norton ever achieved in a month, with a peak of 4.483 million visits in week three; conversely, Norton’s highest-ever visits were 4.104 million, coming in week one.
- The web audience of Norton pulls more U.S. traffic, with 46.08% traffic from America, which is down by 9.83%; on the other hand, McAfee has currently only 25.98% traffic with a positive growth of 7.19%, perhaps indicating enhanced domestic traction.
- McAfee gets a lot of traffic from India (11.32%) and Brazil (3.90%), regions that do not even register among Norton’s highest market areas, suggesting the increasing presence of McAfee in emerging markets.
- Norton has a comparatively higher volume of organic-search traffic (20.33%) than McAfee (16.47%), whereas McAfee gains more through referrals (4.65%), display ads (2.27%), and social media (2.39%), etc., showing the effect of a more diversified marketing approach.
- Norton’s audience tends to be in the older groups, with 47.33% of users aged 45 and up, while McAfee skews toward the younger age group of 18-34 years with 37.38%.
- It is to be highlighted that 100% of viruses get removed by McAfee, while Norton has the rate set at 99.8%, with more cases of false virus alerts.
- Norton holds the highest user satisfaction rating (4.7 stars) and is placed 2nd among antivirus providers, whilst McAfee holds the rating of 4.2 stars and is 7th.
Paid And Free Users
| Provider | Paid users | Free users |
| Norton | 29% | 6% |
| McAfee | 23% | 19% |
| Malwarebytes | 10% | 15% |
| Avast | 8% | 18% |
| AVG | 7% | 12% |
| Webroot | 6% | 1% |
| Bitdefender | 6% | 3% |
| Kaspersky | 4% | 3% |
| Other | 6% | 5% |
(Source: security.org)
- Probabilities show the incidence of various third-party antivirus providers among paid and free users. Norton, the single most important paid choice, accounts for 29 % of paid users; only 6 % of free users selected it, proving it to be enjoyed mostly as a premium solution.
- McAfee finishes second among paid users with 23 %, but reigning in free users is with 19 %, suggesting that it is widely used via bundled or trial versions.
- Malwarebytes has a near-even split with 10 % paid and 15 % free, signifying that it is very popular with both parties.
- Avast is favoured by 18 % of free users and 8 % of paid users, while AVG follows a near-similar path with 12 % free and 7 % paid.
- Webroot has over 6 % paid and 1 % free shares. Bitdefender goes steady with 6% paid, 3% free, Kaspersky 4% paid, 3% free.
- Other represents 6% paid and 5% free, and stands for a host of smaller antivirus providers.
- Looking at the numbers, it appears Norton is predominant in paid subscriptions, whereas McAfee, Avast, and Malwarebytes pack a punch in the free antivirus arena.
Website Visits
Norton
(Source: similarweb.com)
McAfee
(Source: similarweb.com)
- As per Similarweb, Norton vs McAfee statistics show that between May 1 and May 7, 2025, McAfee inched past Norton in terms of visits to its website, with 4.238 million versus Norton’s 4.104 million.
- From May 8 to May 14, McAfee continued with its lead at 4.227 million visits, whereas Norton’s traffic decreased to 3.857 million.
- From May 15 to May 21, McAfee’s traffic grew to 4.483 million, while Norton’s declined further to 3.827 million. May 22-28 was the period of 4.358 million visits to McAfee, up against Norton’s 3.733 million.
- In the last three days of May, McAfee recorded 1.886 million visits against Norton’s 1.656 million.
- Overall, for May 2025, McAfee had more visits to its website than Norton, with the biggest margin during the third week.
Website Traffic By Country
Norton
(Source: similarweb.com)
McAfee
(Source: similarweb.com)
- The Norton site gets the major share of its traffic from the United States at 46.08%, although this figure has suffered a drop of 9.83%.
- Conversely, 25.98% of McAfee’s traffic is contributed by the U.S., and this figure has increased by 7.19%, indicating growing domestic engagement for McAfee as Norton takes a hit.
- The Japanese contribute 7.51% to Norton’s traffic, witnessing a large jump of 7.11%, while McAfee entertains 6.38% from Japan through a marginal drop of 1.99%.
- Germany contributes 6.63% of Norton’s web traffic, with a drop of 6.33%, while McAfee does not seem to enjoy any significant traffic flow from Germany.
- The UK makes up 6.07% of Norton’s audience, but this figure has seen a steep decline of 18.69%, while McAfee stands instead at 3.91% from the UK but with a rise of 9.89%, showing reversed trends in British engagement.
- The Australian end user contributes 3.65% to Norton’s traffic and is down by 16.71%, whereas McAfee does not mention Australia among its top countries.
- Conversely, India and Brazil are most prominent on McAfee, generating 11.32% and 3.90% of the traffic, respectively, both with increases of 3.85% and 4.42%, whereas these countries do not even appear in Norton’s top traffic sources.
- In general, McAfee is finding emerging market traction, while Norton is mainly U.S.-centred with some decline in regional presence.
Marketing Channels
Norton
(Source: similarweb.com)
McAfee
(Source: similarweb.com)
- Direct traffic is the big traffic giant, with Norton virtually neck-and-neck with McAfee at 67.34% and 67.60%, respectively–implying most of the user bases simply type in the URL or use bookmarks.
- Norton appears to have better visibility in search engines as it gets a higher %age of traffic (20.33%) coming from organic search versus McAfee at 16.47%.
- Paid advertising, on the other hand, is where both resemble each other the most, with Norton at 6.44% and McAfee at 6.55%.
- Referrals work better for McAfee than for Norton at 4.65% and 3.04%, respectively.
- Furthermore, display advertising favors McAfee (2.27%) much more than Norton (1.01%). McAfee’s bigger share of social media traffic at 2.39% compares with Norton’s 1.78%.
- Both almost do not stand on email marketing, with only 0.06% of traffic from email campaigns for both.
- Overall, McAfee has greater channel diversification, while Norton remains stronger in organic search.
Social Traffic
Norton
(Reference: similarweb.com)
McAfee
(Reference: similarweb.com)
- Norton draws more than half of its social media traffic from YouTube at 58.44%; McAfee lags behind at 40.15%.
- On the contrary, the Reddit cut is much bigger for McAfee: 28.95% against 16.22% for Norton. On Facebook, both fare similarly: 13.24% for Norton versus 10.60% for McAfee.
- McAfee seems to shine better than Norton on X (formerly Twitter), with 7.10% of social traffic coming through X as opposed to 3.17% for Norton.
- LinkedIn also seems to favour McAfee at 3.78% (less than half of Norton’s 1.68%).
- Lastly, McAfee has a small edge over Norton in terms of traffic from other sources, sneaking in at 9.41% versus a lower 7.25%.
Website Demographics
Norton
(Source: similarweb.com)
McAfee
(Source: similarweb.com)
- Norton and McAfee have relatively similar gender distributions among their website audiences, with Norton showing a slight male majority of 54.92% in comparison to McAfee’s 52.23%.
- Conversely, McAfee displays a higher percentage of female users at 47.77% against Norton’s 45.08%. McAfee, for the most part, attains a slightly younger audience when compared to Norton.
- For example, for the 18–24 age group, 15.89% of McAfee’s users belong in it, contrasting with 14.06% for Norton.
- The 25–34 age range is also more important for McAfee at 21.49% versus 19.76% for Norton. The 35–44 bracket is similarly engaged, with the 18.86-19.12 split.
- The higher age groups command higher %ages for Norton, with the 45–54 group making up 17.37% of Norton’s audience, slightly higher than the 16.77% of McAfee’s.
- Norton had higher numbers of users in the 55–64 segment as compared to McAfee (16.66% to 15.05%), as well as those aged 65+ (13.30% to 11.68%).
- Overall, Norton’s customer base is more balanced or inclined slightly toward the older demographic, whereas those of McAfee tend to be younger and perhaps slightly more gender-diverse.
Norton vs McAfee
According to Enterprisetoday, both McAfee and Norton are other names for antivirus programs; they are appreciated for all their features and great security, but in many ways, they are different in price, simple user experience, and features.
MaAfee
- McAfee is probably one of the best antivirus providers worldwide, providing a vast number of services.
- These services include VPNs, internet security, password managers, encrypted storage, and so forth. McAfee supports major operating systems, including Windows, macOS, Android, and iOS, giving it great versatility. Its ability to protect sensitive documents even after they’ve been deleted is one of the most notable features of McAfee.
- The software claims a 4.2-star rating out of 5 and lists itself 7th out of 22 antivirus platforms. Interestingly, it offers its free version for Android and iOS, adding to its accessibility.
- According to the reports on performance, McAfee reaches 100 % accuracy in virus removal with this reputation as a security solution, yet it maintains.
Norton
- Norton is said to be yet another highly used antivirus in use worldwide. Just like McAfee, Norton supports all major operating systems.
- Gaining a user satisfaction rating of 4.7 stars, higher than McAfee’s, and a ranking of 2nd overall, Norton is a testament to the performance and trust it carries among users.
- It is competitively priced at US$19.99 per year, and, therefore, it may become a drawback not to have any free or trial period, since some people prefer to test before buying.
- With the name of providing robust protection, Norton does get affected by false virus alerts in some instances, causing a little confusion.
- Besides, Norton does not have some of the features that McAfee has, including safe browsing tools and a file shredder, weighing down its utility for people who pursue advanced privacy options.
Conclusion
In the antivirus market of 2024, Norton and McAfee surely stood as sturdy defenders. Norton, however, offers faster scans and a better introductory price, whereas with McAfee, you get some extras thrown in, like VPN and identity tools.
Hence, both being commendable in their own right, Norton is the one to go for if you are cost-conscious, and McAfee is an “all-in-one” security suite for those who want it.
Sources
FAQ.
Among down-outpaid antivirus users, Norton takes 29% of the premium market, compared to 23% for McAfee. However, McAfee takes the upper hand in free antivirus, with 19% of the users, whereas only 6% use the free version of Norton. This simply implies McAfee has a larger audience via free trials and bundled offers.
Both Norton and McAfee present real-time malware detection rates appreciated by all. Norton detects 99.8% of threats while being outdone marginally by McAfee with 99.5%. However, McAfee is better in the removal of viruses, with an accuracy of 100% against Norton’s 99.8% and also with fewer false positives.
McAfee has continued to attract more website traffic than Norton over the years. In May 2025, McAfee compared with the 4.483 million unique visitors, whereas Norton peaked at 4.104 million. Being stronger in emerging markets such as India (11.32%) and Brazil (3.90%), coupled with its more diversified marketing strategy, surely draws more traffic.
On the contrary, Norton is, more or less, U.S.-centric (46.08%) and tends to capture an older audience, with 47.33% of users being 45 and up. McAfee pulls in younger, more international traffic, representing good traffic from India and Brazil in particular, together with 37.38%, aged 18-34. McAfee is also gaining ground within U.S. engagement, whereas Norton is on the decline.
Norton sells for US$19.99/year, competitively priced and has a higher rating from user satisfaction (4.7 stars), but it lacks a free version, which might not appeal to those who are going for the trial experience. McAfee, rated 4.2, on the other hand, provides a free version for mobile users and several other features, such as secure browsing tools, a file shredder, and better virus removal accuracy, so it stands as a more feature-intensive option for those who do not want to pay much for antivirus software.
Maitrayee Dey has a background in Electrical Engineering and has worked in various technical roles before transitioning to writing. Specializing in technology and Artificial Intelligence, she has served as an Academic Research Analyst and Freelance Writer, particularly focusing on education and healthcare in Australia. Maitrayee's lifelong passions for writing and painting led her to pursue a full-time writing career. She is also the creator of a cooking YouTube channel, where she shares her culinary adventures. At Smartphone Thoughts, Maitrayee brings her expertise in technology to provide in-depth smartphone reviews and app-related statistics, making complex topics easy to understand for all readers.
