A recent and somewhat welcoming trend has been the migration of security software to cover a range of devices, rather than having to purchase a separate licenses for your PC, Mac and Android devices.

This offers a huge amount of flexibility – more so than most people realise. Read on.

Kaspersky introduced Multi-Device, which enables you – one user – to secure three or five devices, depending on the license you choose. This could be a combination of three PCs, two PCs and a Mac, a PC, a Mac and Android or any other combination you can think of.

Bitdefender Sphere is even more powerful. Where Kaspersky Multi-Device will protect three or five devices, for one individual only, Bitdefender Sphere enables three separate individuals to protect an unlimited number of devices. You could own a desktop and laptop PC, a Mac, Android smartphone and Nexus tablet. All five devices are covered. You could then give your Sphere license to another person you trust and they can also protect an unlimited number of devices they own, with their Bitdefender account. Under the terms of your Sphere license, you can then offer this to a third person and, yes, they can also protect an unlimited number of devices. The Sphere license is that flexible.

Now AVG has gone down the same route, recently releasing AVG Protection (effectively AVG Internet Security 2015 for your PC, AVG AntiVirus for your Mac and Android), AVG Performance (AVG PC Tuneup 2015 for your PC and cleaning tools for your Mac and Android devices) and the top-of-the-range AVG Ultimate, which will give you all the protection and optimization tools in one money-saving bundle.

AVG Protection, Performance and Ultimate also have flexible licenses, enabling you to protect an unlimited number of devices you own. So, if you have a couple of PCs, two Macs and two Android devices, all six can be covered by one license.