[3] Their collaborative partnership began in the late 1990s with the merger of Seth's Mount Pleasant High School rock band Margo and Scott's college group Nemo.

In early 2001 the stand-up bassist Bob Crawford, formerly of the Memphis Quick 50, joined the Avetts, and the band released their first full-length album, Country Was.

During this time the band began a partnership with Dolph Ramseur, a local label owner who had been impressed by the group's live show and original material.

[11] Mignonette was named after an English yacht which sank off the Cape of Good Hope resulting in the cannibalism case R v Dudley and Stephens.

[12] In 2005, the band released Live, Volume 2, recorded at the Neighborhood Theatre in Charlotte and King's Barcade in Raleigh, North Carolina.

[14] The album was recorded in a lake house in Robbinsville, North Carolina, over the course of 10 days and included collaborations with Paleface and Ian Thomas.

[15] During extensive touring in support of the album Scott and Seth Avett produced The Gleam, an EP of intimate, stripped-down recordings, which was released in September 2006.

[18] In support of the album the band made their national television debut on May 12 on Late Night with Conan O'Brien performing "Paranoia in B-Flat Major.

[23] From September 8 to October 8, 2009, the Avett Brothers released 13 short videos describing their music and fans in anticipation of their upcoming album, I and Love and You.

The performance was recorded the previous year during the band's homecoming concert at Bojangles' Coliseum in Charlotte, North Carolina.

[30] In early 2011, Avett Brothers bassist Bob Crawford learned that his daughter Hallie had a seizure due to a brain tumor.

[29][31] Mike Marsh, formerly the drummer of Dashboard Confessional, which recorded songs from I and Love and You, joined the band as a touring member at their annual New Year's Eve show in 2012.

[42] Near the end of May 2014, Seth Avett and Bob Crawford mentioned in different interviews they were recording demos for their next album, to be produced by Rick Rubin.

[43] During their concert on December 13, 2014, in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, Seth and Scott mentioned they spent November recording songs for their upcoming album.

[46] On March 3, 2016, the band announced the expected release of their ninth full-length studio album, True Sadness, which Seth Avett described as "a patchwork quilt, both thematically and stylistically.

Entertainment Weekly praised the band's experimentation and "willingness to tear down boundaries"[48] while Pitchfork criticized the "baffling layers of synthesizers in what feels like a ploy to push the Avetts into clear Top 40 territory.

[50] On January 31, 2017, it was announced that a documentary about the production of True Sadness, entitled May It Last: A Portrait of the Avett Brothers, directed by Judd Apatow and Michael Bonfiglio, would premiere at the 2017 South by Southwest film festival.

[66] It released to generally favorable reviews and was supported by two drive-in concerts at the Charlotte Motor Speedway to allow social distancing for the COVID-19 pandemic.

[72] The band announced a Fall 2024 US tour in support of the album[73] and revealed that the Swept Away stage play based on their music would be debuting on Broadway in the autumn of 2024.

References to and lyrics by The Avett Brothers feature prominently in Slammed, a New York Times best-selling romance novel by Colleen Hoover.