Convert AVIF to JPG on Windows

Before picking a tool, it helps to split the problem in two. "Viewing" an AVIF means the operating system can decode it well enough to show a thumbnail in File Explorer or display it in the Photos app. "Converting" means re-encoding those decoded pixels as a JPG and saving a new file. A system that handles the first step often cannot do the second step without an additional application.

On Windows, the viewing problem traces back to the AV1 codec. AVIF uses AV1 for compression, and Windows needs a registered AV1 decoder to generate thumbnails and previews. Windows 11 on modern x64 hardware ships with this support built in. Windows 10 frequently does not — which is why some machines show a generic icon for .avif files while others display the thumbnail. The fix for Windows 10 is a free codec from the Microsoft Store called AV1 Video Extension, which adds AV1 decoding to the system and restores thumbnails and Photos previews.

Once you can view the file, you are halfway there. But the Photos app on Windows does not offer a "Save as JPG" export option for AVIF files — it can display them, not re-encode them. That is why the steps below exist. The browser-based AVIF to JPG converter on this page is the shortest path, but the sections below also cover desktop apps and the command line for situations where you want something more repeatable.

The difference between the two versions of Windows matters more for AVIF than for most image formats, because Microsoft rolled out AV1 support incrementally rather than all at once.

Windows 11 on current x64 builds includes AV1 decoding in the operating system. File Explorer shows AVIF thumbnails, the Photos app opens them, and Paint can display them. None of these built-in tools can export to JPG, but at least you are not staring at a broken icon wondering whether the file is valid. If thumbnails are missing on Windows 11, the file may be a very new or unusual AVIF encoding variant — or the system image has not received the relevant Windows Update.

Windows 10 does not include AV1 decoding by default. The consequence is that File Explorer shows a generic document icon, Photos reports "We can't open this file," and you have no visual confirmation the AVIF is even a valid image. The fix is to install the AV1 Video Extension from the Microsoft Store — search for that exact name, it is listed free. After installation and a brief wait for thumbnails to regenerate, File Explorer will start showing AVIF previews alongside other image types. This codec change does not give Windows 10 a JPG export path, but it at least confirms the image is intact before you go looking for a converter.

The right-click context menu on both versions offers "Open with," but none of the built-in options presented will convert the file. Right-click context menus on Windows have no native "Convert image" option the way macOS offers format options in Preview. Every conversion path on Windows requires an additional tool.

The simplest conversion path on Windows is also the one that requires the least setup: use a browser-based tool. Chrome, Edge, and Firefox have all shipped native AVIF support for several years, which means the browser can decode an AVIF file using its own built-in AV1 implementation. It does not depend on the operating system codec situation at all.

The online AVIF to JPG converter on this site works entirely in the browser tab. You drag your .avif files onto the tool area, set a quality level (the default of 85 is a reasonable starting point for most photos), and download the resulting JPGs. The conversion runs on your computer — the files are never transmitted to a server, which matters on machines with a corporate proxy or when working with images you cannot share externally.

This route also works on locked-down corporate machines where you cannot install software without administrator credentials. The browser is already there, the site loads over HTTPS, and nothing hits an installer or requires an elevation prompt. If you have a batch of files, the tool accepts multiple files at once and lets you download them individually or as a single ZIP archive.

• No installation — works in any modern Chrome, Edge, or Firefox on Windows 10 or 11.
• No upload — decoding and JPG encoding both run locally in the browser tab, so files stay on your machine.
• Batch support — drop multiple .avif files, convert them all, download as a ZIP.
• Quality control — a slider lets you trade file size against sharpness before downloading.
• No administrator rights needed — useful for IT-managed or kiosk machines where installing software is blocked.

If you already have an image editor installed, it may be able to open AVIF natively, which gives you full control over the JPG export settings including resolution, color profile handling, and any editing you want to do before saving.

GIMP added native AVIF import and export in 2020. If you are running a reasonably current version, open the AVIF through File › Open, make any adjustments, then go to File › Export As and choose JPEG from the format list. The export dialog lets you set quality, baseline versus progressive encoding, and subsampling. If your version of GIMP does not list AVIF in the Open dialog, updating it is the fix.

Paint.NET is a popular free editor on Windows, but AVIF support depends on version and installed plugins. Newer releases have added it; older ones will show an error when you try to open .avif. If your copy cannot open the file, the browser route above is faster than hunting for the right plugin.

Photoshop added native AVIF support in version 26.8, released in June 2025. Versions before that either cannot open AVIF at all or could pull them in through the Camera Raw plug-in on certain builds. If you are on an older Photoshop and cannot update, the most reliable path is still the browser tool — convert to JPG first, then open the JPG in Photoshop for any further editing.

A common frustration: even on applications that can open AVIF, the "Save As" dialog sometimes does not offer JPG as an option when the active document came from an AVIF. Use "Export As" or "Export As JPEG" specifically, rather than the regular Save path.

For repeatable conversions, scripted pipelines, or simply wanting a one-liner that works without opening any GUI, FFmpeg and ImageMagick are the two tools worth knowing on Windows.

FFmpeg is a multimedia processing toolkit with broad codec support. A standard build includes libdav1d for AV1 decoding. The single-file conversion is straightforward:

ffmpeg -i input.avif output.jpg

If you want to control quality, add the -q:v flag — lower numbers mean higher quality, with 2 being near-lossless and 10 being noticeably compressed:

ffmpeg -i input.avif -q:v 3 output.jpg

ImageMagick 7 uses the magick command on Windows and reads AVIF when the build includes libheif with AV1 support. The basic conversion:

magick input.avif output.jpg

To control quality (0–100 scale, higher is better):

magick input.avif -quality 88 output.jpg

If ImageMagick reports that AVIF is not a recognized format, run magick -list format | findstr /i avif in Command Prompt to check whether the delegate library is present. You may need to install a build that ships with libheif compiled in.

When you have a folder full of AVIF files to convert rather than a single image, PowerShell combined with FFmpeg handles it cleanly without any extra tooling. Open PowerShell, navigate to the folder containing your .avif files, and run:

Get-ChildItem *.avif | ForEach-Object { ffmpeg -i $_.FullName ($_.BaseName + '.jpg') }

This loops over every .avif file in the current directory, calls FFmpeg on each one, and writes the output JPG with the same base name alongside the original. If you want the JPGs to land in a separate subfolder to keep things tidy:

New-Item -ItemType Directory -Force converted
Get-ChildItem *.avif | ForEach-Object { ffmpeg -i $_.FullName "converted\$($_.BaseName).jpg" }

For those less comfortable with PowerShell, the browser tool on this page handles batch conversions without any scripting: drop a folder-worth of files onto the upload zone, wait for the queue to finish, then download a single ZIP. For 20 to 30 files of typical web dimensions it is usually faster than setting up a PowerShell loop for the first time, and the ZIP is ready to hand off immediately.

The PowerShell approach becomes the better choice when the batch is large (hundreds of files), when you need to integrate conversion into a build or deployment pipeline, or when you are already scripting other file operations and want everything in one place.

A common expectation on Windows is that right-clicking an image file and choosing "Open with > Photos" will then offer a "Save a copy" or "Export" option with format choices. For common formats like PNG and WebP, the Photos app on recent Windows builds does offer a save-a-copy path. For AVIF, this is inconsistent — the app can display the image but does not always expose a re-encode-as-JPG option.

The underlying reason is that Windows treats AVIF as a viewable format but not a re-exportable one at the system level. The codec registration that makes thumbnails and previews work is separate from the codec registration that enables format conversion in the system shell. Even with the AV1 Video Extension installed, Windows 10 does not add a conversion path to the context menu — it only adds decoding for display.

This is why the practical answer on Windows is always an explicit tool: browser, desktop editor, or command line. There is no built-in right-click path that reliably converts AVIF to JPG across both Windows 10 and Windows 11. If you need something that works today with minimal setup, the AVIF to JPG converter is the most consistent option across both versions.

One consideration that comes up often on Windows specifically: corporate environments. Many organizations manage Windows machines through group policy or MDM, which can block software installation, prevent access to the Microsoft Store, and route traffic through a proxy that logs destinations. If you are working on a machine like this, several of the options above become unavailable:

• Microsoft Store blocked — you cannot install the AV1 Video Extension, so Windows 10 will not show thumbnails.
• Software installation blocked — FFmpeg and ImageMagick require installer runs or unpacking to a writable directory.
• Proxy logging — if your proxy logs destination hostnames, uploading files to an external server-side converter creates a disclosure record.

The browser tool handles all three constraints. The browser is already installed and already trusted by the proxy. The conversion runs inside the browser tab, so no files leave the machine — there is no upload to log. And since the tool runs as a web page, it requires no installation and no elevation prompt. For confidential images — unreleased product photography, client work under NDA, internal documentation — that local processing model is the right one regardless of what corporate policy requires.

If you need to verify this for a compliance review: open the browser's developer tools, go to the Network tab, and drop a file onto the tool. You will see requests for page assets (the JavaScript that runs the converter) but no outbound request carrying the image data. The file stays in memory, gets decoded by the browser's AV1 implementation, and the JPG is written back to your download folder entirely within the browser sandbox.

Each conversion path on Windows has a different tradeoff between setup time, control, and suitability for repetition. Here is a summary to help pick the right one for your situation.

If you are handling AVIF files that might contain transparency — logos, icons, UI assets with transparent backgrounds — and you want a lossless output, our AVIF to PNG converter is the right tool instead. JPG drops the alpha channel entirely, which is fine for photos but wrong for any graphic that needs to sit over a colored background.