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Malwarebytes vs Microsoft Defender for Business comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 5, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Malwarebytes
Ranking in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
14th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Microsoft Defender for Busi...
Ranking in Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
25th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
Microsoft Security Suite (15th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) category, the mindshare of Malwarebytes is 1.8%, up from 1.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Defender for Business is 1.9%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
 

Featured Reviews

Anas Anas - PeerSpot reviewer
Effective threat predictions, simple to deploy, and light on resources
Malwarebytes's initial setup is simple. It is easy to deploy and configure the policies and the configuration. I deployed Malwarebytes for one customer and I did it in under two days. They had approximately 50 users, it took approximately an hour. The steps I took for the implementation were downloading the Malwarebytes management console from the site, installing it, then running the discovery tool, scanning my network, and checking all of the PCs on my network. It's already pre-configured, you don't need to configure anything. The only configuration that I did on the administration console was some of the exclusion from the scan. This is the only rule that I have created. I rate the initial setup of Malwarebytes a ten out of ten.
Syed Abid  - PeerSpot reviewer
Advanced threat protection secures diverse workloads with cost-effective deployment
If I need logs and don't have local storage bundled with Defender, I need to add workspace and log analytics, which is costly for storing logs of 2 GB, 5 GB, 10 GB. A default storage of 5 GB for logs should be included with Defender. There are limitations in whitelisting folders and files, and the whitelisting feature for Defender threat protection was deprecated. A straightforward feature for this should be added.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable feature is that it stops malware, which is important."
"I like the solution's ability to detect potentially unwanted programs. For some reason, it seems superior to other solutions, or at least in comparison to McAfee."
"Being able to carry out a full scan on your system."
"The dashboard actually is good and it is simple."
"The behavior-based detection is very nice, and it combats zero-day threats by looking for anomalous behaviors."
"The protection is really good with Malwarebytes. It's also user friendly and quite easy to set up."
"It is intuitive and easy to use. For the most part, it does a good job of catching things. It is good at stopping stuff. I did a couple of tests with a password cracker. I tried to load that on, and Malwarebytes didn't let me do that, which was pretty good. It has a rollback feature that I haven't seen with any other company. If one of your endpoints are hit with mass ransomware, you could actually roll it back. I watched a demo of them do that, and it was pretty sweet."
"Provides successful ransomware shut down operations."
"The interface is quite user-friendly."
"The security features are valuable because they come with more capabilities that other licenses do not have, including the enterprise license like E3."
"Microsoft Defender for Business is good for small and medium-sized businesses. It offers solid security flexibility and integration with tools like Microsoft Lighthouse and some other software. It takes some of the features of Defender for Endpoint EDR and provides those services for small and medium-sized business environments."
"I haven't had any problems with the tool's stability."
"Microsoft Defender for Business works well with the Microsoft Azure Security ecosystem, including Defender for Endpoint and Office 365 Cloud."
"Defender's main strength is its integration with Microsoft Sentinel, offering valuable insights."
"I rate Microsoft Defender for Business a 10 out of 10."
"The most effective features of Microsoft Defender for Business include its threat detection and response capabilities in managing vulnerabilities and ransomware attacks."
 

Cons

"The product could be improved in blocking malicious traffic, such as communication with known malicious IP addresses."
"The interface could be improved. Currently, you need to really dig around to find the elements you need."
"This solution reports far too many false positives!"
"I would like to see integration with other vendors going forward."
"Malwarebytes is not there in the reports from Gartner or IDC...If we look at the market trends and the industry, most customers look at Gartner's reports to identify whether a product is a leader, challenger, or a big product, depending on which they choose."
"Requires increased efficiency in terms of detecting false positives."
"The reporting is not as flexible as you would find with other antivirus software."
"We had a little performance problem with the solution, but that's been resolved. Since then, it's been running well."
"The user interface has a lot of features which can make it complex and hard to adapt to for some users."
"The solution's AI is notorious for false positives, and the time you have to spend training it is ridiculous."
"We faced some issues while running some applications on Mac."
"Additionally, the pricing policy poses a challenge, particularly in multi-year contracts, where other solutions like Trend Micro offer more affordable options."
"If I need logs and don't have local storage bundled with Defender, I need to add workspace and log analytics, which is costly for storing logs of 2 GB, 5 GB, 10 GB."
"Talking with the tool's technician about any problem is very complicated."
"Threat protection could be improved even though it is already a built-in feature."
"Pricing could be lowered as it is expensive and not suitable for low-budget organizations."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing is per seat, with clients being a little less expensive than servers. If we need more licenses, we can accomplish that within a day. As Malwarebytes adds new features to their product, such as DNS filtering and a patching module, they want to charge us more even though we're a premium user, which isn't ideal."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is a low price and ten is a high price, I rate the product's pricing a seven."
"Malwarebytes is a cost-effective product."
"Its cost is around $60 a machine. The cost of the total solution for 250 people is about $8,500 a year. If we add EDR to it, it will bring that cost up to about $15,000. The cost for Carbon Black is about $25,000, which is $10,000 more, but you get all AI functions with it."
"I rate the tool's pricing a five out of ten."
"I would say that it's affordable. It costs much less than Sentinel One, CrowdStrike, or anything of that nature. But, at the same time, you are getting what you pay for. So I would say it's one of the best when you're comparing traditional NextGen AVs like Webroot that aren't the best in the bunch."
"It is really expensive. We've got between 30 and 40 licenses every year, and for the number of licenses that we have, we're finding that Malwarebytes on average costs between $900 and $1,000 more per year than comparable options. We're paying about $3,300 per year for these licenses. There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fee."
"The price of Malwarebytes is in the middle range compared to other vendors."
"Since we're a nonprofit, we get pretty good discounts on the tool."
"The tool's cost has been a little high, but I do not think it was terrible."
"The tool is cheap, while some other solutions are more expensive. I remember the tool cost about five euros for a workstation or for a user on a monthly basis."
"It has to get more competitive because we are starting to see some of the competitors providing better pricing, and some of it, of course, is to gain market share. The Defender product pricing is probably a little higher than the competitors."
"Defender for Business is included by default with an Office 365 premium subscription."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
University
12%
Government
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Computer Software Company
19%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Retailer
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Malwarebytes?
Ten times a day, improved signatures will be downloaded, so it is very up-to-date in terms of malware experience.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Malwarebytes?
I really hate the automatic rebilling without officially confirming it with me. It's an annoyance and they should at least confirm with me, like a month before they bill me.
What needs improvement with Malwarebytes?
It takes up too much space when it's trying to run in the background.
What do you like most about Microsoft Defender for Business?
A few things are valuable. One is the alerting we see when any kind of intrusion is happening, any kind of malware is being deployed across the endpoints, or any kind of suspicious activity is goin...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Defender for Business?
Microsoft Defender for Business offers the best pricing option in the market and is very cost-effective.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Defender for Business?
The areas where Microsoft Defender for Business could improve include the support, installation process, and wiki. I should be able to find solutions to issues quickly without having to delve too d...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Knutson Construction
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Malwarebytes vs. Microsoft Defender for Business and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.