Every time Googleās policies worm their way into Brave I think Iām using the wrong browser. Now I canāt even save a PNG image as a PNG image.
We all know the evil game Google is playing, here. Theyāre trying to force this format down our throats every way they can and Iām tired of Google treating the web like their private ecosystem. I may as well be using Chrome at this point.
@Ball not sure what youāre speaking of. A lot of times format originates based on what the website has it posted as. But to show, I just went to Google and typed in Brave Browser and to image searches. I saw the below:
I right clicked on an image and chose Save Image As
It opened the prompt for me to name it and choose file type. But by default, it was as you see below:
Once saved to the desktop, I checked its properties:
Brave has never forced people to download a specific way. It first checks how itās shared by the website. Then it goes by us. Even if it tries to download in another format, we can always change it. Such as adding .png or .gif at the end and changing the file to All Files.
AVIF and WBP use advanced compression techniques to provide comparable or better image quality at smaller file sizes. This results in faster load times and reduced bandwidth consumption for websites, which can help improve the user experience. As such, you will encounter a variety of websites that will upload using plugins that convert the images as such.
This is why many websites are starting to use it instead. Brave is having you download the format as it actually exists according to the websites coding.
And to give an example of an AVIF file I found. Youāll see it defaults to wanting to download AVIF because thatās how it is displayed on the website.
But then I changed file type away from AVIF and named the file to the file extension/type I wanted, which was .png. At that point, I have a .png file. I was able to do the same for JPG.
Looking further into it what is probably happening is the web site is serving an AVIF (named PNG) based on the HTTP request header. Unfortunately, I see no way of disabling AVIF
@Ball have you tried renaming the file when you choose Save As or its Mac equivalent? Ending the file name in the format you want generally will do it, but you also have to make sure to look at the Save as type area if there is one as it can sometimes override.
You are right that thereās no inherent way to change it beyond as I mentioned above.
Otherwise, I know people have mentioned using extensions which can streamline the situation. Before I mention anything, I want to premise with the warning below:
WARNING
I do not know if itās any good. Extensions always carry risk of data collection, malware, etc. So do your research before making a decision.
An example of one I know I saw mentioned is https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/webp-avif-image-converter/pbcfbdlbkdfobidmdoondbgdfpjolhci
Again, I never used it or tested. Also havenāt researched to know anything of that particular extension. It will be up to you to research and decide if you want to test it or any other extension out there.
The only solution Iāve found is to use a browser which does not support avif
In other words you havenāt tried anything I mentioned and only wanted to come here to complain?
@Ball,
As you yourself stated before, this behavior is due to the image being served by the site and is not related to what browser youāre using. So switching browsers will not solve this problem for you.
Further, as @Saoiray states, you can download files with the AVIF extension and simply rename and replace .avif with .png (or .jpg or whatever format) and the image will show just the same. I just tested this myself and had no compatibility issues.
You are experimentally dead wrong. The browser 100% changed which image format was downloaded using the same URL.
Proof:
file 2.png
2.png: ISO Media, AVIF Image
Can you share the site in which youāre seeing this behavior so I can take a look on my end?
Try this link as an example (no guarantees)
https://p3-ofp.static.pub/fes/cms/2021/10/19/42mxcv6qjjyzc9bv4hxlhxe6bfnr44358979.png
Compare saving this via Brave vs using wget or a browser that doesnāt support avif
Not sure there are any modern browsers that donāt support AVIF. Firefox, Edge, Chrome, Brave, Vivaldi, Safari, etc., all handle AVIF the same way. The only way to avoid this would be by using outdated browser versions.
Just a note, wget isnāt a browserāitās a tool primarily used to download data.
Itās interesting to see how opinions differ on this. While youāre frustrated with AVIF support, there have been others who were upset when Edge didnāt support AVIF. For example, check out this discussion: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/75459594/why-doesnt-edge-support-avif-images
Regarding your other point:
You mentioned that the browser changes the image format when downloading. What I meant earlier is that you may need to edit or change settings yourself. If you save an image without editing, it will save in the format itās currently in, which is AVIF. From your feedback, it seems you havenāt mentioned trying this or shown any screenshots. Expecting the browser to automatically convert to a different format than what the file is uploaded in isnāt typically how browsers operate.
About the example link you provided:
It seems similar to a discussion we had here: Image.jpeg is saved as .avif, unknown format - #5 by anon57438784. You might want to check out the extension mentioned there as a potential solution.
Accurate.
Yes, it does indeed download as .avif and the same goes for other browsers when tested ā here is Firefox:
Ultimately there does not appear to be a Brave issue here, unless youāre having some issue where every image from all sites is saving as .avif then thereās not much we can do here. As @Saoiray mentions, there are extensions you might be able to use to help you here but other than that, just change the file extension when necessary.
The file is a png. If you download this file without a header specifying avif support, it sends the original file unaltered. I donāt know how to interpreted anything I said to mean I expect the browser to convert anything.
@Ball, I understand that the link you shared indicates the image is in PNG format. However, many web hosts use plugins to automatically convert images to formats like AVIF or WebP when they are displayed. For example, thereās a discussion about this on Webmasters Stack Exchange: https://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/141819/what-is-avif-and-why-do-website-builders-automatically-convert-jpeg-images-to-i. This is consistent with what Iāve learned from various discussions, articles, and AI inputs.
Another discussion that might be helpful is on Super User: https://superuser.com/questions/1545456/how-do-i-force-png-or-jpg-images-to-be-downloaded-as-png-or-jpg-instead-of-we. They talk about how this is often controlled by the server and suggest ways you might modify the URL or browser agent to ātrickā the server into delivering a PNG instead. However, Iām not sure how effective this method is now, as the discussion is a few years old.
What Iām trying to convey is that itās usually the web host that converts the file type as it serves the content. Youāre right that if youāre using a browser that doesnāt support certain formats, it might default to downloading in a supported format as a fallback. However, most modern browsers aim to maintain the fileās original format as itās hosted. As I mentioned earlier, you also have the option to choose the format when saving or downloading images.
and as I demonstrated, you can try to save it in a different format, but it doesnāt work. You can try it yourself using Brave and the file command
Hereās how to figure out whatās likely going on:
$ curl https://p3-ofp.static.pub/fes/cms/2021/10/19/42mxcv6qjjyzc9bv4hxlhxe6bfnr44358979.png > no-header
$ file no-header
no-header: PNG image data, 560 x 450, 8-bit/color RGBA, non-interlaced
$ curl -H "Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,image/avif,image/webp,image/apng,*/*;q=0.8" https://p3-ofp.static.pub/fes/cms/2021/10/19/42mxcv6qjjyzc9bv4hxlhxe6bfnr44358979.png > brave
$ file brave
brave: ISO Media, AVIF Image
$ curl -H "Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,image/webp,image/apng,*/*;q=0.8" https://p3-ofp.static.pub/fes/cms/2021/10/19/42mxcv6qjjyzc9bv4hxlhxe6bfnr44358979.png > no-avif
$ file no-avif
no-avif: RIFF (little-endian) data, Web/P image
$ curl -H "Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml,application/xml;q=0.9,image/apng,*/*;q=0.8" https://p3-ofp.static.pub/fes/cms/2021/10/19/42mxcv6qjjyzc9bv4hxlhxe6bfnr44358979.png > no-webp
$ file no-webp
no-webp: PNG image data, 560 x 450, 8-bit/color RGBA, non-interlaced
$ ls -lh no-header brave no-avif no-webp
-rw-rw-r-- 1 5.9K Aug 29 16:09 brave
-rw-rw-r-- 1 7.9K Aug 29 16:09 no-avif
-rw-rw-r-- 1 69K Aug 29 16:08 no-header
-rw-rw-r-- 1 69K Aug 29 16:10 no-webp
So essentially, the server is using the Accept header in order to serve the most optimized (as in file size) version of the image based on the capabilities advertised by the client.
Brave never gets to see the original PNG file and so it canāt offer to save that to disk for you.
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