Bitdefender Tops Breach Prevention and TCO in Latest AV-Comparatives EPR Tests

The cybersecurity industry has long debated whether prevention or detection is more important. The AV-Comparatives EPR Comparative Report 2025 settles the debate. By measuring both, it reveals that prevention-first is the winning strategy—stronger, simpler, and more cost-effective. Bitdefender GravityZone didn’t just participate in the evaluation; it led across the board.

Bitdefender achieved the highest detection rate among all participating vendors and the lowest Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), underscoring a commitment to both security efficacy and operational efficiency. The evaluation also proves that modern security means blocking threats before they disrupt business.  

AV-Comparatives EPR Test Results 

The EPR Comparative report reveals the performance of 12 vendors. Bitdefender GravityZone proved its superior prevention capabilities as the only vendor to block 100% of the 50 tested attacks during the first phase of the attack lifecycle. Our platform’s multi-layered security architecture and decades of fine-tuned engines are the foundation of this proactive defense.  

This prevention-first strategy—our ability to stop attacks before they cause financial or operational damage—leads to dramatic cost savings. The report calculates that GravityZone has the best Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) among all tested companies, demonstrating that prevention is not just possible, it's the most cost-effective security strategy.  

The report also highlights Bitdefender as the only vendor to support all advanced EDR capabilities on the evaluation list—while eliminating that complexity for security teams through features like Incident Advisor, which simplifies investigations and speeds response. Bitdefender’s EDR also stood out for its effectiveness, with a 98% detection success rate, significantly above the 91% average of other participants. 

When paired with the visibility and analysis of a comprehensive EDR/XDR platform, a prevention-first approach is the strategic choice for modern security.  

The EPR CyberRisk Quadrant 

Based on the 2025 evaluation, Bitdefender sits at the top right corner of the AV-Comparatives EPR CyberRisk Quadrant. This represents that Bitdefender provides the greatest prevention and response capability while maintaining the lowest TCO.

Figure 1: Bitdefender sits at the top right of the AV-Comparatives EPR CyberRisk Quadrant with the highest prevention and response capability while maintaining the lowest TCO.

AV-Comparatives describes this quadrant as a visual representation of each product’s “effectiveness at preventing breaches, the calculated savings resulting from this, the purchase cost of the product, and the product’s (in)accuracy costs.”    

Breaking Down the Evaluation 

AV-Comparatives designed the EPR test to highlight three key phases in an attack:  

1. Endpoint compromise and foothold
2. Internal propagation
3. Asset breach

It conducted 50 attack scenarios that included each of the three phases and mapped them to the MITRE ATT&CK Framework. Each participating vendor was evaluated and scored based on their ability to prevent the attack from moving further down the attack chain. Every time an attack successfully moved to a new phase, that vendor lost points from their score.   

The AV-Comparatives Test Methodology 

The AV-Comparatives EPR test was conducted between June and August 2025. Each product from the twelve participating vendors was graded on its active and passive response abilities. Active response corresponds to each solution’s ability to take action on the threat without intervention by the security team. Passive response indicates that the security team received an alert and was required to take action to prevent the threat from moving further down the attack chain.  

Bitdefender’s ability to deliver an “active” response alleviates the burden on security teams of having to constantly respond to attacks.  Many Bitdefender customers have praised the solution for its “set it and forget it” nature, allowing staff to focus on other areas of security such as hardening systems, and managing identities.

In the evaluation, only products that achieved at least 92% combined active and passive response scores were “certified” by AV-Comparatives. The test evaluated Bitdefender GravityZone Business Security Enterprise, the company’s unified security, risk analytics, and compliance platform that delivers advanced endpoint protection (EPP), endpoint detection and response (EDR), extended detection and response (XDR), and cloud-native security. 

Bitdefender Delivers 100% Active Protection 

When the dust settled from these new tests, Bitdefender emerged as the clear winner. Of the twelve products evaluated, Bitdefender was the only solution to achieve 100% Active Response in the initial endpoint compromise and foothold stage.

Bitdefender proved to be the most effective in preventing an attacker from gaining unauthorized access, executing malicious code, or establishing a foothold in a network. This is significant.

In medical terms, this is akin to being completely immunized against a virus, whereas others only treat the symptoms of the virus once they appear in the body. Detection and response are important parts of the security chain, but as AV-Comparatives has stated, “A good burglar alarm should go off as soon as someone breaks into your home. It should not wait until they start stealing.” 

Security Without Disruptions 

The AV-Comparatives test also evaluated the Operational Accuracy and Workflow Delay Costs of a solution. According to AV-Comparatives, operational accuracy was measured by performing “typical user activity in an enterprise environment.”

This means opening and copying clean files on systems and across networks, surfing clean websites, and using administrative tools for legitimate purposes, all without unwanted interference by the security solution. This aspect was calculated into the total cost of ownership, as over-blocking or over-reporting of such activity can lead to costly business disruptions. Bitdefender did not incur any operational accuracy or workflow delay costs.  

Feature-Rich EDR 

For the first time in the AV-Comparatives EPR Test, the report revealed information on key endpoint detection and response (EDR) technologies that each solution was equipped with. AV-Comparatives did this to highlight the importance of having advanced detection technology. Fourteen EDR technologies were analyzed in this round of tests: 

• Antimalware Scan Interface (AMSI): Allows applications to integrate with the antimalware product on the system.  
• Event Tracing for Windows (ETW): Used to trace and log events for both user-mode application and kernel-mode drivers 
• Microsoft Threat Intelligence: Used to trace and log events with Microsoft TI 
• User-Space API Hooking: Used to intercept API function calls in user space 
• Kernel-Space API Hooking: Used to intercept Kernel-level API calls
• Kernel-Callback Routines: Monitors functions the Kernel calls during specific events or when specific conditions are met 
• Filter Driver: Detects the suspicious modification of device drivers
• Minifilter Driver: A filter driver used to monitor the modification of system files 
• Early Launch Anti-malware Driver (ELAM): Scans drivers for indicators of malware during the boot process 
• Firmware Protection Drivers: Protects the system’s firmware from unauthorized modifications 
• Hardware Breakpoints: Pauses program execution when key memory locations are accessed
• PEB Manipulation: Detects when the Process Environment Block (PEB) is manipulated with – common in driver hijacking attacks
• Vectored Exception Handling: Allows the security solution to perform certain remediation actions when a hardware breakpoint is triggered
• Call Stack Analysis User Mode: Allows the debugging of the execution code to trace the call stack of running applications 

Bitdefender is the only solution that incorporates all of these EDR technologies. The inclusion of some of these tools also helped Bitdefender to earn an Anti-Tampering certification from AV-Comparatives earlier this year. Plus, over the past three years, Bitdefender has achieved the highest Real-World Protection rates of any vendor in the AV-Comparatives Business Security Test.  

Exceptional Enterprise-Level Security without the Enterprise-Level Cost 

In the EPR test, AV-Comparatives also measured the total cost of ownership of each solution. Using a hypothetical 5000 endpoint environment over a 5-year license, AV-Comparatives analyzed the test results and calculated any additional costs based on operational accuracy and workflow delay.  

The results demonstrate that Bitdefender achieved the lowest Total Cost of Ownership among all evaluated vendors. Bitdefender delivers enterprise-grade security without the exorbitant costs typically associated with the high quality of protection it offers. 

Figure 2: AV-Comparatives TCO Calculated 

Conclusion 

The outstanding results from the AV-Comparatives Endpoint Prevention and Response (EPR) Report for 2025 are not an isolated event, but a powerful example of a larger trend. Bitdefender's 100% success rate in stopping attacks at the initial phase demonstrates a crucial shift in cybersecurity: the most effective defense is a proactive one.

While many other solutions focus solely on detecting and responding to threats after they've breached the perimeter, Bitdefender GravityZone demonstrates that prevention is not only possible but also the most cost-effective strategy for protecting your organization. 

Read the AV-Comparatives report or explore the Bitdefender GravityZone unified security platform to learn more.