AVG Cleaner Review: An In-Depth Look at Mac and Android Versions

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Sarah Miller
Updated on July 01, 2024 Preview 4.9K Preview 0
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Junk files, duplicate files and other unwanted files accumulate over time. They are useless. What’s more, they take up precious storage space. AVG Cleaner is designed primarily for the purpose of removing unwanted files and freeing up space. Is AVG Cleaner any good? What features does it offer? Is it safe to use? Find the answers in this review.

What is AVG Cleaner?

AVG Cleaner for Mac and AVG Cleaner for Android are developed by software company AVG Technologies. The app is not available on for Windows PC, iPhone and iPad. If you are looking for AVG Cleaner for PC, you can try AVG TuneUp for PC instead. Despite the same and some shared features, the Mac version and the Android version also offer some different features. The main benefits of both versions are cleaning up useless files and helping improve the overall performance of your device.

 

Is AVG Cleaner safe?

AVG Cleaner is safe.

From a safety perspective, AVG Cleaner for Mac and AVG Cleaner for Android are safe to download and install. You can easily remove the app from your device at any time by performing a standard uninstallation.

From a usage perspective, both versions are safe operate. The app will never delete any file without your request. In addition, AVG Cleaner for Mac will delete user-selected unwanted duplicate files by sending them to Trash. You can undo the deletion by getting files back from Trash.

Download & installation

  Download Compatibility Size
AVG Cleaner for Mac Download from Mac App Store OS X 10.8 or later 27.6 MB
AVG Cleaner for Android Download from Google Play Android 4.1 and higher Varies with device

Note: The Android version is also included in AVG TuneUp.

The app is lightweight. It’s very easy to uninstall. To do so on Mac, select the app in Finder, control-click and select Move to Trash. For Android devices, there can be several ways to uninstall the app.

Pricing & upgrade

Is AVG cleaner free? AVG Cleaner for Mac is totally free.

AVG Cleaner for Android is free to download and use. It contains ads and in-app purchases. To get rid of ads and have unlimited access to all features, you need to upgrade to AVG Cleaner Pro. The good news is that you can enjoy the Pro features for free for 30 days.

To upgrade to AVG Cleaner Pro for Android, just tap the Upgrade button in the upper right corner and select a preferred subscription plan. There are two plans: Monthly subscription and Annual subscription. You can cancel the subscription at any time.

Note: The Pro version available may be different according to your region, and the price may vary.

AVG Cleaner for Mac review

Note: When you first launch the app, you can find options like Create AVG MyAccount and Log in to AVG MyAccount. From the Mac App Store reviews, we can know that quite a few users have experienced login issues. This happened to us too. We tried to log in and received a message say "Email and password don't match". Nevertheless, the fact is that you don't have to log in to use AVG Cleaner.

AVG Cleaner for Mac consists of two features: Duplicate Finder and Disk Cleaner.

AVG Cleaner for Mac main screen

Duplicate Finder

  • Scan To look for the duplicate files in a folder, add the folder to scan by dragging and dropping. Alternatively, you can click the Scan Folders button. Wait for the scan to finish.AVG Cleaner for Mac scans for duplicate files
  • View duplicates Click View Results. In the right panel, you will find a list of detected duplicate files, organized by file type. Click the triangle icon to expand a file type, say, Pictures. There you will find groups of duplicate images. You can double-click a file to open it in Finder. This way, you can easily preview the file and view its attributes.view, select and delete duplicate files
  • Select and delete AVG Cleaner offers two selection options: Keep oldest and Keep newest. You can also select or unselect manually. Click Clean in the upper right corner of the interface to send the selected duplicate files to Trash.

Pro Tip: In the top menu bar, select AVG Cleaner > Preferences. There you can set the Duplicate Finder to include or exclude hidden files when it scans for duplicate files. Click the Cleaning tab. You can set the app to directly delete unwanted duplicates by unselecting checkbox before Move duplicates to Trash.

Is AVG Cleaner Duplicate Finder good? We used AVG Cleaner and a few dedicated duplicate file finders to scan the same folders. It did a decent job in the test.

Pros

  1. Various supported file types such as images and audios
  2. Good at finding duplicate videos and images
  3. 2 selection options allowing users to quickly select files for deletion
  4. 2 removal options including Move duplicates to Trash
  5. One-click deletion of selected duplicate files

Cons

  1. Slow scanning
  2. Not so good at finding duplicate documents and archives
  3. No preview
  4. High CPU usage
  5. Sometimes the Preferences window doesn’t display properly

Disk Cleaner

  • Scan Click Scan Mac, and the Disk Cleaner will start scanning for junk files on your Mac. You can customize settings in Preferences if needed.
  • View results Click View Results. The results are grouped into several categories such as Trash, Junk files, Application caches and Logs. It also lists files that accumulated in your Downloads folders.AVG Cleaner Disk Cleaner
  • Select and delete By default, AVG Cleaner for Mac will automatically select files in all categories (such as Trash and Junk files) except for Downloads. You can also do the selection manually. Click the Clean button to get rid of unwanted files in one click.

Pros

  1. Can find different types of useless files
  2. Multiple selection options
  3. One-click deletion
  4. Users can choose to scan or ignore application caches and logs

Cons

  1. Consumes too much CPU and memory
  2. Can’t exclude specific apps from being scanned

Quick summary

By finding and deleting useless files such as caches and duplicate files, AVG Cleaner can free up space on your Mac. This app does its job well, considering it’s freeware.

However, there are some drawbacks. We all know that we should be cautious with what we delete on our computer. That’s why some cleaning apps and duplicate file finders have features like exclusion list and warning before deletion. AVG Cleaner doesn’t allow users to exclude specific apps, folders and subfolders from scanning and deleting. Also, there is no warning when you click the Clean button.

Best alternatives

#1 CCleaner

Just like AVG Cleaner, CCleaner for Mac is also designed to clean clutter and free up space. However, it can’t find duplicate files. Compared to AVG Cleaner offers more features, options and security measures.

In addition to being a disk cleaner, it also offers features like Uninstall and Erase Free Space.

When using this app to analyze and clean up application caches, you can easily include or exclude applications. This way, you can prevent important files and data to be removed.

CCleaner for Mac analyzing applications caches

In Options, you can customize settings and include or exclude folders. There are also some other useful options. For example, you can efficiently select the cookies you want to keep before cleaning Internet browser caches. You can’t find features or options like this in AVG Cleaner for Mac.

Pros

  1. Good at finding junk files, application caches, etc.
  2. Offers useful tools like Uninstall and Startup
  3. Enable users to include or exclude folders, and applications from removing
  4. Gives warnings before when you deleting things
  5. Allows high degree of customization

Cons

  1. Doesn’t find duplicate files

#2 Cisdem Duplicate Finder

As the best duplicate file finder for Mac and Windows, Cisdem Duplicate Finder can be a perfect alternative to AVG Cleaner Duplicate Finder.

duplicate files on Mac

It has a feature called Ignore list, which enable you to exclude files, folders and subfolders from scanning and removing. You can also set it to ignore certain file types and formats when looking for duplicate files.

AVG Cleaner has a feature to specify file size range, so does this alternative app. You can easily select minimum and maximum file size for scanning.

There is a powerful built-in preview function which works for photos, videos, audios and documents. There are three preview modes, allowing you to easily compare files side by side including images before delete them.

preview duplicates before deletion

Pros

  1. Excel at detecting duplicate photos, audios, videos, docs, archives, etc.
  2. Can also find similar images
  3. Allows users to exclude files, folders and extensions from scanning
  4. Multiple scanning, filtering and removal options
  5. Remove duplicates from folders and drives
  6. Remove duplicates from Mac’s Photos
  7. 3 preview modes including side-by-side comparison
  8. Useful features like Auto-Select & One-click Deletion
  9. Available for both Mac and Windows

Cons

  1. Can’t find junk files

Free Download   Free Download

AVG Cleaner for Android review

Designed to free up storage space on Android and improve device performance, the Android version has the following main features and benefits.

  • Uninstall apps including pre-installed apps
  • Remove cache and junk files
  • Clean RAM
  • Hibernate apps
  • Analyze files
  • Provides system info
  • Free up more space
  • Improve the overall performance of your device
  • Help boost battery life

This review will focus on three main features including Quick Clean, Apps and Photos.

Quick Clean

When you open the AVG Cleaner, you can easily find the Quick Clean feature on the main screen. When you tap it, it will start checking for junk files on your phone.

AVG Cleaner for Android Quick Clean

It’s safe to clean the items under Safe to clean. You can tap the expand icon to check them out.

AVG Cleaner for Android Quick Clean details

Note: Once you perform a Quick Clean, there isn’t an option to get the deleted files back.

Apps

When you tap Apps in the lower right corner of the main screen, AVG Cleaner for Android will start analyzing the apps on your device. Alternatively, you can find the feature by tapping the 3-dot icon in the upper left corner. Once the analysis is completed, to help you keep your device fit, the app will give you a few tips:

  • Tip 1. Boost performance
  • Tip 2. Battery drainer
  • Tip 3. Biggest apps
  • Tip 4. Find unused apps

For each tip, more details and solutions will be provided. For example, by tapping SHOW ALL under Boost performance, you will find a list of the top apps that use the most RAM. You can select one, multiple or all listed apps and stop them by tapping SELECT APPS TO STOP.

Photos

If you tapping Photos on the main screen, AVG Cleaner for Android will start analyzing photos and screenshots on your phone. Likewise, it will also give you tips, details and solutions.

This feature can find:

  • Bad photos: photos that are of low quality
  • Similar photos: images that look the same or similar
  • Optimizable images: images that can be compressed to save space
  • Old photos: photos that are taken a month ago

As a result, you can easily find the photos that you may not want anymore and get them removed by deleting or by moving them to cloud storage. This way, you can free up a lot of space.

On the main interface you can also find two other tools: Memory and Tips. Memory tool is a shortcut solution to cleaning up RAM. When you tapping Tips, AVG Cleaner will analyze the entire device and list comprehensive tips to optimize device performance. In addition, there are also other minor features such as Cloud Transfers and System Info, which can be useful.

Pros

  1. Clean caches, memory and RAM
  2. Automatic cleaning feature (Pro only)
  3. Effective battery optimization
  4. Offers an array of other useful features
  5. Easy to use with simple, intuitive interface

Cons

  1. Limited cleaning when compared with tools like Clean Master

Best alternatives

  • Clean Master - Antivirus, Applock & Cleaner
  • Nox Cleaner - Phone Cleaner, Booster, Optimizer
  • Super Phone Cleaner: Virus Cleaner, Phone Cleaner
  • Super Cleaner - Antivirus, Booster, Phone Cleaner
  • Phone Cleaner- Cache Clean, Android Booster Master

The alternatives listed above can be found on Google Play. In addition to having the same the functions and benefits with AVG Cleaner, some of them also provide other useful features like the antivirus feature.

Conclusion

AVG is an established name in the world of security and productivity software. AVG Cleaner for Mac is totally free, and the Android version also offers a free edition. You can easily download and try the app. Based on this AVG Cleaner review and your own experience, you can quickly find if it’s the cleaning app that suits you best. If not, you can also try the alternative apps mentioned above. Do you find this review useful? What do you think makes good cleaning software? Let us know in the comment section below.

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Sarah Miller

With a passion for tech and writing, Sarah joined Cisdem, where she focuses on creating articles about using utility tools to enhance file management and simplify contact management.

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