# AVIF

Hacker Approved page: https://hackerapproved.com/p/avif/

46 people recommended AVIF in Hacker News comments, 21 had mixed feelings and 42 criticized it, November 2025 to October 2026. It was recommended in 8 of 12 months, in 23 threads. It does not meet the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Free, royalty-free image format that gives smaller files than JPEG and WebP at comparable quality. Caveats: slow encoding and uneven browser support.

Summary written by Claude from 52 comments. It was written before the November 2026 recount, and 51 of those comments still count.

## Why people recommend it

- Smaller files at comparable quality (10 comments in the sample): "avif is typically significantly better at small files sizes where loading speed (or saving data) is the priority" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49993009)) "Smaller AVIF images look ok, but the equivalently sized JXL images look way worse, so I gladly serve AVIF." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46120488)) "I changed all my .jpg files to .avif a few years ago. The benefit I get is much more than 20%." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49693923))
- Strong for animated images (3 comments in the sample): "I'm guessing the better suggestion would be to use apng or animated avif if you are looking for a proper gif alternative." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46610671)) "Especially for animated images. Comparing webp or avif sizes to gif is easily a factor of five to ten when animated." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50047225)) "you can zoom in on an AVIF so for actual animated images it wins on that front" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50048979))
- Free and royalty-free (2 comments in the sample): "AVIF is also free, and since it's literally the I-frame of an AV1 stream, it can be decoded directly on the GPU" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50129678)) "AVIF is royalty-free, with open-source implementations not developed by Google." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49690847))
- Widely supported by browsers (2 comments in the sample): "Way wider browser adoption, potential to evolve together with AV#, since it's using a container format" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46214648)) "It's widely supported by browsers, and rivals JPEG XL in being the best lossy image format." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46709118))

## What people warn about

- Slow encoding and heavy CPU use (4 comments in the sample): "avif was even better compression for some cases, but seems to take a long time to generate, and less widespread browser support." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50048300)) "it's smaller than WEBP in the normal modes (s6; s>=7 switches to real-time mode which sucks and s3 takes centuries" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50320256)) "Sadly a folder full of avif files will make pretty much any consumer cpu in existence chug like mad" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46838447))
- Only wins at very low quality (3 comments in the sample): "AVIF is better but only equal or worse at decent, visually transparent bitrates." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49439461)) "AVIF only comes out as superior at extreme compression ratios at much lower bit rates than are typically used for web images" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46036534)) "no its not remotely competitive with JXL, the only benchmarks it trades blows are ones with laughably low quality settings" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46118967))
- Trails JPEG XL on features (2 comments in the sample): "AVIF does seem to have at least a couple of downsides compared to JXL like max 12-bit depth" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49696223)) "It seems quite limited compared to the JPEG XL ability to truncate the bitstream anywhere" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49694038))
- Uneven browser and tool support (1 comment in the sample): "There is also AVIF format which is newer and better but it needs to still mature a bit with better support/compatability." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47422778))

## What people recommend instead

- [JPEG XL](https://hackerapproved.com/p/jpeg-xl/): 137 recommend, 23 mixed, 59 criticize

## The badge

A product earns the Hacker Approved badge when at least 10 people recommend it, recommenders outnumber critics at least 2 to 1 (mixed feelings count toward neither side), it was recommended in at least 4 of the 12 months and in at least 5 different threads, and no single thread supplies more than half of the people who recommend it. Health and money products are never badged.

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "AVIF", https://hackerapproved.com/p/avif/ (46 recommend, 21 mixed, 42 criticize; Hacker News comments, November 2025 to October 2026).

Counts updated 3 Nov 2026, with data through October 31, 2026.