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10 Worst Freeware Programs
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Please Note
The programs, the resulting list of programs, and the listed order of the programs are nominated entirely by visitors to this website, and the nominated programs are not those chosen by the owners or operators of the site. The opinions of visitors are a personal matter and not the official position of the website. The opinions of visitors to this website may be entirely wrong and are not endorsed by the owners or operators of this website.
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The 10 worst freeware apps is not a list many developers would want to be on - but it's a list you'll want to see. These are programs best avoided except by masochists with three hours to spare to do a simple job, and some have a very poor security record. Strangely, the last factor often applies to programs from the biggest software authors, who you would think - surely? - would have security as their #1 feature. The world of software is a strange place...
Please add your comments so we can pick the winners. The choice is yours.
Defining a bad freeware program
Just because software is free doesn't mean it's good. Like commercial software, some freeware isn't particularly good. But there is an interesting difference here: some freeware supplied by large software houses as an upgrade route or a marketing exercise may have issues in the areas of security, privacy and quality. Because these programs are universally advertised it seems a good idea to point out that they are not the most desirable and there are better options. In some cases these free options from large producers have been notable clunkers.
Bad freeware is: hard to use - the programs don't do what you want - they do things you don't want - they only do half of the job - you have to upgrade to get basic functionality - they are time-limited or have nag screens - they install unwanted additional apps or spyware - they are simply poor at what they do - they don't work in all the circumstances a good app does - they have annoying faults - new issues turn up regularly - the upgrades are worse than the preceding version - they have a bad security record - and all the rest of it.
Please state the reasons you don't like a nominated program - we haven't used them for years as they are famously grim, so you need to remind us why they are the pits.
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The 10 Worst Freeware Programs - as voted by Gizmo's Freeware visitors
1. Internet Explorer
Not too grim in its latest incarnation - but previous versions were truly awful, and deservedly gave IE the reputation as the worst all-round browser available. A rogue browser that was never standards- compliant and has an appalling security record. Hated and despised by web designers due to the wide range of problems it causes. Some nasty privacy issues, and a direct pipeline into your PC for many trojans. No matter how good IE might eventually become, no web pro will forget how stupendously bad IE6 was - and it's still out there causing problems as for some reason there are still corporate and government users locked into using it.
2. Adobe Acrobat Reader
Not very good as a PDF reader, several annoyances, takes the longest to start up of just about any PDF reader known, has had numerous security exploits, comes from a firm with a poor record for security.
3. MSN Messenger
In at #3 comes this popular messenger app. Almost guaranteed to be found on any kid's PC, along with associated problems that can't be noted here, it's famously bloated and in the past was a notorious conduit for botnet control of PCs.
4. Real Player
Intrusive, privacy issues.
5. Quicktime
Intrusive, privacy issues.
6. Windows Media Player
Far too dependent on Internet connectivity and data transfer that no other good media player needs in order to work. Missing several popular codecs, generally annoying when other players just work.
7. iTunes for PC
Not really a PC app in the first place. Restrictive licensing conditions mean the program is controlled by others, not the PC owner.
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[Removed]
Winzip (no longer freeware)
Gizmo's Bottom Pick - the worst freeware program of all time
Nominations:
Internet Explorer 6
- Article type:
Comments
Please add to the list all of published MSN messengers.
I cannot describe in human language how big is the problem with MSN..
yawn. another constructive anon post! as chris.p states below, just hearsay unless a case is stated. have a try at describing?
The major messengers, MSN aka Windows Live and Yahoo Messenger. They're bloated, they drag a system down, whoever wrote the programs thinks they're the only item you have to run on a system.
The same is probably true now of AOL Messenger and ICQ.
I would add Skype to it unless Skype has been improved because the convenient little download of the "install program" wants to download another 40 meg or more of files to install.
another constructive anon post!
Me, I think MSN Messenger is grim. But all the kids I know love it, so it can't be all bad. I guess it depends.
We're probably looking for stuff here that has some seriously good arguments as to why it's bad. Botnet infections? Just hearsay unless somebody states their case.
chris.p
You forgot to ad the AOL virus, the Yahoo Trojan and Bing (the great pretender) that, comparatively, routes you to commercial sites rather than your your simple quest for a information...(don't believe the latter....run a Google search and then run a Bing Search.)
also, can you elaborate on the 'AOL virus, the Yahoo Trojan'.
Indeed, '....run a Google search and then run a Bing Search.'
'But here's an important difference — I didn't find any harmful links from Bing's results.' compared to google.
http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00001897.html
And what about Incredimail ?
Very intrusive, privacy issues, hard to totally uninstall.
I've been using Incredimail as a primary email client on one of my systems for almost a year. I've had no problems whatsoever with intrusiveness or privacy. I have, in the past, uninstalled and reinstalled three times over several weeks, and each time Incredimail uninstalled completely. In my opinion, Incredimail free version does not deserve mention on the worst page, but should be on the best page, somewhere in the top 7. I wonder what happened on your system to see it in such poor light. I hope you revisit your comment post here, and if you could, please give more details about the problems with Incredimail so I can take a new look at it.
can you provide some concrete examples of your allegations?
Wow! I have all of the listed five installed. What a plonker i must be. Not sure if this fits the criteria; Can i please nominate the 'Ask Toolbar'. It tries to always sneak in through the backdoor. If sucessful, it is very difficult for the novice computer user to remove. Also, Jeeves looks the most creepiest of men on the internet.
Hey, don't feel bad, we've all had those things installed at one time or another.
I suppose a toolbar is an app, and it's free (in a manner of speaking) - so why not.
If something is hard to remove, it might qualify as spyware.
chris.p
WinAmp???
OK, thanks for the suggestion - but please provide some reasons. Whatever software is suggested, others will find perfectly acceptable. So the reasoning needs to be given.
chris.p
The truth hurts!
Not for long! If you don't like it, just delete it and hope it goes away! :)
How many more critical comments are you going to delete? Last time I looked there were 32, now there are only 23.
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[edit]
And any more that might be from the same person will be deleted. This is called trolling.
Signed correspondence (ie comments made while signed in) will be looked at more favorably but the same point of view repeated ad nauseam is not acceptable.
chris.p
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Heh heh, all those rabid Adobe employees and fanboys are now foaming at the mouth.
The User Account Controller is my vote for the worst HIPS program ever made in the history of planet earth!
It almost made Vista a disaster all by itself.
lol
It's not freeware, it's part of an operating system.
What exactly is the point of this? If a freeware program is not listed in your reviews, which the bad/poor freeware presumably is not, why bother listing it at all?
Listing various programs as poor or bad doesn't help anybody. People come here to find good software.
This just pans various software to no good purpose. Seems petty and pointless. There are plenty of sites and forums panning software. It strikes me that this is not a good addition to this site.
Distancing yourself from the results is no substitute for not doing something like this in the first place.
agreed, to an extent. gizmos was, and should be, about 'best' freeware only. why not leave the 'slating' to the forums and comments, and other sites. for the most part, the articles speak for themselves. it could be seen that 'gizmos freeware' is slowly, but surely, losing its so called integrity.
Easy to hide behind an anonymous comment and pretend the problem doesn't exist. The consumer is uninformed because the mainstream media cannot afford to offend their largest advertisers. Luckily we have no advertisers so are entirely independent.
More people need to have the courage of their convictions and expose the poor performance of multi-million dollar companies in this area. Small and medium-size software houses seem to understand their duty to the consumer better. If firms with a million-dollar budget for development can't do a better job then nobody can complain if they are slated. More of us should stand up and shame them.
It's no good advocating the use of small firm's freeware when every time I go around to a family member's house to sort out a computer I find it needs stripping down and rebuilding as it's riddled with spyware, due to running two or three of these mega-name apps because the owner assumed they were beyond reproach.
A lot more needs to be done to stop people using these big brands in the first place.
chris.p
yes, it is 'easy' to 'hide behind' anonymous voting. it's also 'easy' to 'hide behind' so called disclaimers!
as stated, for the most part the relevant 'best free.....' article speaks for itself. eg in the 'non adobe pdf' article it says 'Sick to death of Adobe's slow, bloated PDF Reader?...' (you could even expand on this with something regarding its recent security issues)
if you are so concerned about things, why don't you step up then and write a full featured constructive, and of course 'independent', review of the 'free' software you/tsa consider to be 'poor'. you will no doubt get plenty of anon 'comments' agreeing with your findings.
You are not completely independent, you are completely dependent on your users, and on freeware.
Ranting about this stuff on here, or starting crusades against "The Worst Freeware", apart from being objectionable in itself, will alienate a lot of people.
If you don't want people to disagree with your opinions, then you shouldn't post them.
If you don't want people to post anonymously, ( which is a good idea in view of some of your ill-considerd replies), then you shouldn't allow it in the first place.
These companies are there to make money, not to satisfy your whims in regard to freeware. Without such companies society as it is would collapse, and there would be no software at all.
Freeware is a modern concept only made possible by the infrastructure built and maintained by the companies you so despise.
You wont "shame" any companies at all, they don't operate like that, not even the small ones. They operate on profit. All you will do is upset people.
Can't agree. More people need to complain about this stuff until the mainstream media catch on to it and do something about it.
Large websites advocating the use of these apps doesn't help. The site writers don't know, and they need to be told. There is a general silence about this area simply because nobody will speak out, as you're up against the big boys.
Just because a program is well-known doesn't mean it's any good. The reverse seems to be true in some cases. Time to shout about it instead of maintaining the silence.
If, in three or four months, nobody much has voted here then maybe I'll think again; but somehow I don't think that will be the case.
chris.p
You need to educate your family members then, not rant about it on here.
So you think it's OK that people download Adobe Acrobat Reader and use that? You think it's OK that people use Internet Explorer because they know no better?
Just as it is useful to know what the best are, it's useful to know what to avoid - especially if that is being heavily promoted. If you don't tell people, they will never know any better, due to the intense promotion / advertising.
People who know no better, which includes the vast majority of computer users, will not be looking for freeware. For the most part they will be using the software bundles which came with their machines. This is the main promotion channel for home users.
Usually people only start looking for alternatives if they have a problem. If they don't know that Adobe READER (The only people who will BUY Adobe ACROBAT http[COLON]//www[DOT]adobe[DOT]com/products/acrobat/ know what they want it for, it isn't freeware, and there are no freeware alternatives for it), for instance, is poor in comparison to some other software, they wont even notice. It works, it's free, and many organisations promote it. That a lot of people don't like it and consider it bloatware or even well on the way to spyware is beside the point.
There are thousands upon thousands of freeware programs which are quite useless to most users, some are even harmful in various ways. Nevertheless, if you have nothing good to say about something, then it is better to refrain from saying anything at all.
Some of the software already mentioned here has obviously been mentioned because people don't like it. At one time some of it was the only freeware available with the required functions. Now calling it "The Worst Freeware" is arrogant and stupid, especially on a site like this, as quite a few companies may simply decide to suspend any further development on such software which they mainly see as advertising if sites like this pan it. Not to mention small independent developers who do stuff like this for fun and kudos.
Sites like this need to be encouraging freeware, not panning it. They rely on it for their existence, and it's stupid to saw off the branch you are sitting on.
"The Worst Freeware" is stuff that will harm your machine or you. But there is plenty of commercial software which will do that too.
If you don't already know why it's wrong to put various freeware into such a category, then there is no point in discussing it.
nCleaner
i do not believe itunes should be here, its the only good software for managing ipods. i have yet to see some other free alternative with all the features and compatibility for ipod related stuff.
You're right I think. People should put their reasons anyway. Probably what the commenter meant is iTunes on a PC, which is a nightmare.
It's a bad music player, incredibly hard to transfer to other PCs, has loads of silly rules that stop you using your own music that you paid for, and is generally advertised as a paid-up fully-sorted music library and player when it is absolutely nothing of the sort. Probably fine on an iPod no doubt, and that's where it should stay.
chris.p
Acrobat, IE, Windows Media Player, Realplayer, Quicktime...also Avidemux which is best considered as a bug.
Internet Explorer 6
Guaranteed to be #1 on the worst of the worst list.
If IE is considered freeware (comes free with Windows, isn't it), then it is the worst among all browsers!
Adobe pdf reader. Multiple exploits, takes forever to load.
WinZip is not freeware. Can't be in the list.
And do we need this list? Even if a freeware is not good, its still hard work of someone, who has kept it free. Why include it in such a list, and maybe discourage future freeware developers. I am not in favor of such list, even if it is for fun. If you don't like a program, just avoid it.
You can make such list for commercial apps, because they take your money, and if then they don't get the job done, then surely they deserve some negatives for it.
At one time it was freeware so I guess someone thought it still was. It's always being quoted as the one to get if you don't have a zip app, on web pages with a zip download, inferring that it's free. But like Acrobat, you'd best avoid it.
I don't agree with your opinion that we should not list bad programs, otherwise people will still download and use things like Acrobat because they assume it must be OK as it's recommended everywhere.
If you think it's OK that we don't try and stop people downloading and using a program that would score down near the bottom of any list of good PDF readers, that takes an incredibly long time to start up, and that comes from the firm that had 2009's worst security record of any large software house, with several apps in the worst 10 list of big-name apps with multiple exploits (including Acrobat) - and they might have been up there in 2008 as well, not sure - then OK let's not tell anyone just how bad some of these apps are.
If we don't tell people, then because of the advertising, they'll assume these heavily-promoted programs must be OK and even among the best.
I certainly agree with you that small-scale developers need all the help they can get. But how many freeware apps are there exactly? 10,000? 100,000? Half a million? Maybe more. And if you are telling me that people shouldn't be warned about the worst 10 apps out of 100,000 or whatever - I sincerely believe you are mistaken.
I did, also, feel that way. But now I believe I was wrong and the time has come to warn people about it. Remember, this stuff is being advertised constantly. Subliminally, people think these programs are OK, because basically they are being constantly told they're good. To conteract that we need to tell people the real state of play. Time to take the gloves off.
chris.p
Hmmm... some of your points are valid. Oh yes, Acrobat, crap software :D... so many vulnerabilities, and bulky. There you go, I suggested one... LOL. But well, that was the primary reader we all used to use, when other options were limited.
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