Buying a Digital Picture Frame? Make Sure It Has These Two Features

Electronics

Buying Advice

And here’s a secret: The top-rated frame on the market doesn’t have one of them.

If there’s one tech product I won’t shut up about, it’s digital picture frames. I genuinely think every household should have one, because who wouldn’t want to see a running slideshow of precious memories? Why do we snap all those photos on our phones, only to leave them trapped there for occasional small-screen viewing?

Modern frames have bigger, better screens than their predecessors, and they’re easier to use as well: You can transfer photos easily via an app on your phone and invite friends and family members to do the same.

Best of all, they’re pretty affordable, with prices starting as low as $60.

OK, but before you add a photo frame to your shopping cart (and I have a few recommendations, below), make absolutely sure of two things:

Does the app mark photos you’ve already uploaded?

Different frames use different apps to manage photos. And they’re usually pretty straightforward: Grant access to your phone’s camera roll, choose one or more photos, tap Send. Presto, the pix wing their way to your frame.

The Frameo app adds a little paper-airplane icon to photos you’ve already sent to the frame.

The next time you go through this process, the app should flag (usually with a little icon or check mark) the photos you’ve already sent. Otherwise, it’s all too easy to accidentally send the same one(s) again, resulting in duplicates in your slideshow (and less storage space available for your next batch of photos).

Good news: The Frameo app, which is used by many off-brand frames, now supports this feature. (It didn’t used to!) But there are still a lot of frame apps that don’t, which I consider inexcusable. It’s a simple bit of software coding that makes the user’s life significantly easier. Steer clear of frames that lack it.

Can you export your photo collection?

Over time, your frame is going to amass a large, totally unique collection of pictures — especially if you invite friends and family to participate. And whether those pictures live in the frame’s own storage or on a cloud service, that library belongs to you; you should be able to do whatever you want with it.

For example, you should be able to export and/or download it for backup purposes, or for migrating to a different frame if you’re so inclined. It only makes sense, right?

Shocker: Products made by Aura, which appear in the vast majority of photo-frame best-lists, don’t give you this option. You can download individual pictures, one at a time, but not the entire library.

I consider this inexcusable as well, and it’s why I don’t recommend Aura frames. (There are a few other reasons as well, including an annoying auto-zoom feature that can’t be disabled globally; you have to toggle it off one picture at a time, a process that’s awkward and ill-documented.)

Now that you know what to look for, what frames pass muster? Here are three that I’ve tested personally and can definitely recommend:

Don’t let the brand name bother you; this YunQiDeer digital picture frame works well, looks nice, and costs well under $100.

YunQiDeer 10.1-inch Digital Picture Frame: Unlike a lot of off-brand frames, this one has been around for awhile. It features ample storage, a decent screen, and the aforementioned Frameo app. Plus, you can easily export your photo library to a flash drive or memory card. It’s currently $80, but watch for sales; I’ve seen priced as low as $60 and even $50.
Homture Magic Frame: True to its name, this attractive 10.1-inch frame can work a little magic on your photos. Powered by AI, its app can animate, colorize, and/or clean-up any snapshot. It’s a gimmick, yes, and you do have to purchase credits for this after the first few. But the frame itself is quite good, with a bright, high-resolution screen, free unlimited cloud storage, and the option of preloading it with pictures for gifting purposes.
Pexar Starlight: Feel like splurging? The Starlight’s 15.6-inch anti-glare screen is easier to see from across the room, and it includes a nifty “gallery light” that casts a gently glow behind the actual frame. It also has twice the storage of most frames — 64GB — enough to hold roughly a gajillion photos and videos.

So grab a frame and free your photos from the tiny confines of your phone!