AVIF is the newest mainstream web image format and it is very good at what it does. It routinely produces files half the size of a comparable JPEG and a fraction of the size of an equivalent PNG. That efficiency comes from the AV1 video codec, which is also why so much software still refuses to open the format. Older Photoshop releases need a plugin, most print workflows reject it outright, and plenty of desktop viewers show nothing but a broken thumbnail.
PNG is the opposite trade. It is larger, sometimes dramatically so, but it is understood by essentially every piece of software written in the last twenty five years. Converting is the pragmatic move when you need a file that just works rather than a file that is small.
When you should convert AVIF to PNG
The reason to move an image out of AVIF is almost always compatibility rather than quality. AVIF is already the better format on a modern web page, so converting a site asset backwards makes it heavier for no benefit. Converting makes sense when the destination cannot read AVIF at all.
Because PNG is lossless, the conversion adds no new artifacts of its own. Whatever the AVIF encoder discarded when the file was first made is already gone and cannot be recovered, but nothing further is lost on the way out. The PNG you get is an exact copy of the decoded pixels.
- Convert when you need to open AVIF files in an editor or viewer that does not support the format.
- Convert when a client, printer or marketplace only accepts PNG or JPG uploads.
- Convert when the image has transparency you need to keep, since PNG stores a full alpha channel.
- Keep the AVIF when the file is going straight onto a modern website behind a picture element.
- Choose JPG instead of PNG when the image is a photograph and file size matters more than exactness.
Expect the PNG to be much larger than the AVIF
This surprises people every time, so it is worth stating plainly. A 180 kilobyte AVIF photograph can easily become a 4 megabyte PNG. That is not a fault in the conversion. AVIF spends effort throwing away detail your eye cannot resolve, while PNG is required to store every pixel exactly, so the two formats are not remotely comparable on size.
The growth factor depends on content. Flat graphics and screenshots with large areas of identical colour compress well as PNG, so the increase might only be threefold. Photographs with fine grain and smooth gradients are the worst case and can grow twentyfold. If exactness does not matter, convert to JPG or WebP instead, since both are lossy and land far closer to the original AVIF size.
Browser support for decoding AVIF
Decoding is the widely supported half of AVIF. Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Opera and Safari all read AVIF images natively, which is exactly the capability this tool depends on. Very old browsers and some embedded webviews do not, and there is no polyfill that can be applied after the fact.
The tool handles that honestly rather than optimistically. It asks the browser to decode each file and, if the decode is refused, it stops and tells you the browser cannot read AVIF instead of producing a blank or corrupted PNG. If you hit that message, updating the browser or trying a current version of Chrome or Firefox resolves it in practice.
Encoding is the other story. Writing AVIF from a canvas is currently a Chromium only capability, which is why converting in this direction is universally available while converting the other way is not.
How this AVIF to PNG converter works
Three browser primitives do all of the work and no server is involved at any stage. The File API reads the bytes you dropped in, the browser image decoder turns the AV1 payload into pixels, and a canvas re encodes those pixels as PNG through the toBlob method.
The practical consequence is that your image cannot leak, because it never travels. There is no upload request to intercept, no temporary copy on someone else's disk and no retention policy you have to take on trust. Open the network panel in your developer tools and run a conversion if you want to confirm it. The usual limits disappear too: no queue, no daily cap and no file size ceiling beyond the memory your device can spare.
Converting several AVIF files at once
Drop a whole folder in and this AVIF to PNG converter decodes and re encodes every image with the same settings. Each result is listed with its original size, its new size and the change between them, so the outliers are easy to spot before you download anything.
Files are processed one after another rather than in parallel. Encoding several large PNGs at the same time competes for the same memory and usually triggers garbage collection pauses that cost more time than the concurrency saves. A dozen typical images finish in well under a second on current hardware.
Anyone reaching for an avif to png online service is usually trying to solve exactly this: a folder of files a colleague sent that nothing on their machine will open. Doing it locally is faster, and the images never leave the laptop.
| Property | AVIF | PNG |
|---|---|---|
| Compression | Lossy, optional lossless | Lossless only |
| Transparency | Full alpha channel | Full alpha channel |
| Typical photo size | 100 to 300 KB | 3 to 6 MB |
| Browser decoding | All current browsers | Universal |
| Desktop software support | Patchy outside recent releases | Effectively universal |
How to convert AVIF to PNG
- 1
Add your AVIF files
Drag one or more .avif images onto the drop area, or click it to open the file picker. Files stay on your device.
- 2
Decide what happens to transparency
PNG keeps the alpha channel by default. Turn on the flatten option only if you need a solid background behind transparent pixels.
- 3
Convert the batch
Press convert and watch the progress bar. Each image is decoded and re encoded as lossless PNG in turn.
- 4
Download the results
Take each PNG individually or download the whole set in one action once the panel reports it is finished.
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Sources and further reading
- MDN: Image file type and format guideReference documentation on how browsers handle AVIF, PNG and every other image type they support.developer.mozilla.org
- W3C: Portable Network Graphics specificationThe official PNG specification, covering the alpha channel and the lossless compression this tool writes.w3.org
- web.dev: Choose the right image formatGoogle engineering guidance on when AVIF, PNG and JPEG each produce the smallest useful file.web.dev
Frequently asked questions
Common questions about the avif to png converter.
No further quality is lost. PNG is a lossless format, so the pixels the browser decoded from the AVIF are stored exactly. Detail the original AVIF encoder discarded is already gone and no conversion can bring it back.
Because AVIF is lossy and PNG is not. AVIF discards information the eye cannot easily resolve, while PNG must record every pixel exactly. A tenfold or twentyfold increase for a photograph is completely normal rather than a sign of a problem.
No. Decoding and encoding both happen in your browser using the canvas element. Nothing is transmitted, stored or seen by anyone else. You can verify it by watching the network panel of your developer tools during a conversion.
Yes. PNG supports a full eight bit alpha channel, so transparent and semi transparent pixels come through untouched. If you would rather have a solid background, turn on the flatten option and pick the colour before converting.
Older browser versions shipped before AVIF decoding was added, and some embedded webviews still lack it. Current Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Opera and Safari all decode AVIF, so updating the browser is normally enough to fix it.