Editorial policy · Last reviewed 10 November 2026

Sources and how we cite them

Every independent review, audit and survey cited on InstallShelf, with the rules we follow for paraphrasing and linking to them.

A recommendation is only as useful as the evidence behind it. This page lists every outside publication cited on InstallShelf, says what kind of source it is, and sets out the rules we follow when we use one. Every link opens the original so you can check us.

The distinction that matters is between facts and judgement. Platform, licence, price and publisher links come from our directory data. A review, audit or survey is paraphrased here with its publisher named. The decision about whether to install something is ours, and we say so on every page.

How we cite

• We summarise independent reviews in our own words, name the organisation, give the year, and link to the original. We do not paste review text, star ratings, score tables or charts.
• Where a testing lab restricts reuse of its published results, we describe the kind of test it runs and link to the report rather than reproducing its numbers. AV-Comparatives is one such lab, and its 2025 report is cited that way.
• A source is only used where a reader can check it themselves. Scraped roundups, reprints and AI-generated 'reviews' are not sources, so they are not cited here even when they rank highly in a search.
• A citation supports a fact or a caveat. It never substitutes for our own recommendation: the decision, the trade-off and the 'when to skip it' line are written here, and they stay ours even when we disagree with the reviewer.
• We do not run benchmarks or lab tests. Where a page quotes a number from a published survey, the survey and its sample size are named on the same page.

Sources used on this site

22 sources are cited across 28 pages that carry a named source. A page with no first-party source we trust simply has no citation section; we do not fill the gap with an aggregator or a generated roundup.

What we still do not do

• We do not run benchmarks, lab tests or hands-on performance measurements, and no page here implies otherwise.
• We do not host, mirror or reupload installers. Every download link goes to the publisher's own website.
• We do not accept payment for a placement, a ranking or a recommendation. See the About page for the full editorial policy.

Corrections

If a source has moved, a report has been superseded, or we have misread one, tell us. Corrections are made to the page and, where the mistake is material, noted on this one.