Is a digital photo frame with an app worth buying?
A digital photo frame with an app is a great choice for both families and elderly users, thanks to wireless photo sharing, remote configuration, and a hard-to-beat level of accessibility and convenience. A handful of the best digital frames come with a mobile app, with Pix-Star’s frames being one of the most popular choices on the market at the moment.
A digital photo frame with an app lets you send photos directly from your phone’s gallery to one or more receiving frame(s). Some premium frames even let you share video and audio clips, bulk share photos as folders and collections and even remotely configure your frames.
If you’re going to buy a digital photo frame with a mobile app, make sure there are no hidden recurring or extra fees. For example, some popular digital frames like Skylight and Nixplay have “Plus” subscription packages that are required to unlock features including access to the mobile app, cloud storage, and multi-frame control groups.
Do digital photo frames with mobile apps charge monthly fees?
Some of the most popular digital photo frames with mobile apps charge subscription fees, namely Nixplay and Skylight digital frames. These frames lock access to their mobile app – along with several other features – behind their “Plus” subscription paywall. We don’t usually recommend buying digital frames with extra recurring fees as they often fail to offer anything sufficiently unique to justify their far higher long-term cost (when you factor in the cost of the subscription over the frame’s life).
For comparison, Pix-Star grants full, free access to the Pix-Star Snap mobile app when you buy a Pix-Star frame. There are no extra recurring or subscription fees required to unlock any feature. Despite being free to use, Pix-Star Snap is still highly versatile, letting you send up to 250 photos to several Pix-Star frames at the same time – making them one of the best value for money frames on the market at the moment.
How to send photos to a digital photo frame with an app?
Make sure you install the Pix-Star Snap mobile app on your iOS or Android device. Once installed, add your Pix-Star frame’s unique and dedicated email address to the app. Note that you only need to add the frame once. In the future, you’ll simply need to select the desired frame from the list of added Pix-Star frames.
Select all of the photos from your phone’s gallery (via the Pix-Star Snap mobile app). You can also select entire folders and collections to make bulk photo-sharing more efficient. With Pix-Star Snap, you can send up to 250 photos to several receiving Pix-Star frames at the same time – no matter where you are in the world.
Once a photo has been sent, it’ll be marked in the photo selection stage to ensure you don’t send the photo more than once to the same frame.
Can a digital photo frame with an app play video?
Pix-Star’s digital photo frame lets you send 2-minute video clips to any of your Pix-Star frames from anywhere in the world. Additionally, you can send 2-minute audio recordings from within the app. While 2-minute video clips might not seem like much, it’s more than what most competing frames offer.
For comparison, Nixplay and Skylight frames charge a subscription fee to unlock access to the mobile app and grant the user permission to send video clips. While you can send very short (15-second) video clips, you still need to pay for Nixplay or Skylight “Plus” to share video clips up to 60-seconds long.
Other top digital frames including Aura don’t support video or audio playback; whereas Pix-Star’s frames let you play videos in slideshows alongside photos, set them to play muted, and play music over slideshows (from a connected USB or SD card).
How do digital photo frames with mobile apps work?
Some popular digital photo frames offer a mobile app that lets you send photos to any connected frames from anywhere in the world. In Pix-Star’s case, the Pix-Star Snap mobile app sends the photos to the frame’s unique and dedicated email address. As these photos are received, they can be set to display in the current slideshow. Additionally, all incoming photo mail is saved locally to the frame’s 8GB internal storage and is backed up to the cloud.
Pix-Star’s frames offer free-for-life cloud storage, which can be remotely managed via the Pix-Star web dashboard. Here you can delete photos, start a slideshow remotely, and much more. This remote configuration feature is coming soon to the Pix-Star Snap mobile app and is currently under development.
How to set up a digital photo frame with an app?
Download and install the Pix-Star Snap mobile app on your iOS or Android device, getting the app from either the Play Store or the App Store. Once installed, simply add your Pix-Star frame’s unique and dedicated email address to the app. Note that this only needs to be done for the first time – the app will remember your frame. You can select all receiving frames from the list of previously added frames.
Once your frame is added, make sure it’s connected to Wi-Fi and is powered on. Select the option to send photos from the app’s home screen. Select the photos from your phone’s gallery and hit send. Additionally, you can share entire folders and collections from your phone to make bulk photo-sharing more efficient.
Note that with Pix-Star’s frames, you don’t need to pay any extra or recurring fees to gain access to the Pix-Star Snap mobile app. This isn’t the case for some competing subscription-based digital frames including popular choices such as Skylight and Nixplay digital photo frames with an app.
Can I remotely update a digital photo frame with its app?
Remote configuration is a feature that lets you manage and control all of your Pix-Star frames from anywhere in the world. Currently, Pix-Star’s remote configuration feature is available using your frame’s web dashboard – or your multi-frame control group’s web dashboard.
Remote configuration is coming soon to the Pix-Star Snap mobile app and is under development. Soon you will be able to remotely manage your frame’s settings, cloud storage, and more – all directly from your phone (via the Pix-Star Snap mobile app).
