What is VirusTotal?
VirusTotal is an online service that analyses files and URLs with more than 70 antivirus scanners and URL and domain blocklisting services, plus tools that extract other signals from the content. You can upload a file, paste a URL, or look up a domain, IP address or file hash, and see which engines flag it and what else is known about it.
It is free for non-commercial use and acts as an aggregator rather than promoting any one engine. Results are shared with the security community and partners, and users can comment and vote on items, which helps spot false positives. Premium services for companies add advanced search, threat hunting and file downloads, and the service is now part of Google's security offering.
Main Features
- Scan files and URLs with more than 70 antivirus engines and blocklists
- Look up domains, IP addresses and file hashes
- Community comments and votes on files and URLs
- Neutral aggregator that does not promote any single antivirus engine
- Free public API for registered users, limited to 500 requests a day and 4 a minute
- Browser extensions and desktop uploaders for submitting items
- Premium API and services for threat hunting, sandbox behaviour reports and sample downloads
How to Get Started with VirusTotal
- Open virustotal.com and choose File, URL or Search.
- Upload a file, paste a link, or enter a domain, IP address or hash.
- Read the detection results, details and relations, and check community comments for context.
- Sign up for a free account if you want an API key or want to comment.
VirusTotal Pricing
VirusTotal is free for non-commercial use, and the public API is free for registered users with a limit of 500 requests a day and 4 requests a minute. The public API must not be used in commercial products or business workflows. Premium services and the Premium API are sold to organisations by quote, with no public price list.
Who Should Use It?
- Anyone who wants to check a suspicious file or link before opening it
- SOC analysts enriching alerts with detection data
- Malware and threat researchers
- IT support teams investigating possible infections
- Journalists checking links and attachments sent by sources
VirusTotal Alternatives
- urlscan.io: a web sandbox that shows exactly what a suspicious page loads.
- Censys: an Internet intelligence platform for investigating hosts, certificates and domains.
- Have I Been Pwned: a free service that checks whether an email address appears in known data breaches.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is VirusTotal free?
Yes, VirusTotal is free for non-commercial use, and registered users get a free public API with 500 requests a day. Commercial use and the Premium API require a paid licence from VirusTotal.
Is it safe to upload private files to VirusTotal?
Be careful. VirusTotal shares submitted files and results with its security partners, and file contents may be available to premium customers. Do not upload confidential documents or files containing personal data; search by the file hash instead.
Does a clean VirusTotal result mean a file is safe?
Not always. A result with no detections only means none of the engines flagged it at that moment. New or targeted threats can go undetected, so treat the result as one signal among several.