More details. Mueller wrote:
“AVIF is an open image file format based on the AV1 video compression standard. It’s supported by all major web browsers, and images in AVIF image file format are supported by a variety of services and platforms on the web, including WordPress, Joomla, and CloudFlare. It’s not recommended to blindly make sweeping changes to images across a website: take the time you need to evaluate which format works best for your specific needs. If you do choose to change image file formats for some of your images, and if this results in changes to filenames or extensions, make sure to set up server-side redirects.”
Why we care. If you are using workarounds for AVIF files on your sites, you no longer need to. Google now natively supports AVIF file types in Google Search.
Also, any workarounds you have, you can now remove.
Make sure to watch your Search Performance reports for any changes you make around AVIF files, to ensure Google is processing those images properly going forward.