What is the best digital picture frame for families?
Looking for the best digital picture frame for families can be a big challenge – especially if you’re new to the market. On paper, many of the top digital picture frames look like excellent choices. Sadly, many of them don’t live up to expectations. You need to choose carefully, which is why we’ve put together this quick guide for you.
Pix-Star’s digital picture frames are arguably the best digital frames for families on the market at the moment. With features like free-for-life cloud storage, extensive Wi-Fi capabilities, and one of the most robust feature sets at the moment – they’re great choices for even the busiest and biggest families.
You can link and control up to 25 connected Pix-Star frames from a single user account. This is all done through the intuitive web dashboard. Here you can change the settings of connected frames, start slideshows, manage local & cloud storage, and much more. You can start & manage slideshows from anywhere in the world. All you need is an online frame and an internet connection.
It’s a fantastic feature for families that have elderly users that don’t want to be left out. If they want all the latest photos, you can simply send them via the mobile app or web interface then remotely start a slideshow with those photos – no matter where you are. It eliminates the drawback of anyone not being tech-savvy or familiar with the interface.
Pix-Star’s mobile app (Pix-Star Snap) lets you send pictures, videos, and audio messages to multiple Pix-Star frames at the same time. You can send up to 250 pictures in one go and can add as many frames as you’d like. There’s no need for the app users to create accounts and all they need is the receiving frame’s unique email address. If you’re concerned about privacy, you can simply select which addresses to accept pictures & other media from. You can block any unwanted photos and can even set the frames to request manual acceptance for any new incoming photos.
Perhaps Pix-Star’s most family-oriented feature is its web album support. Here you can select, link, and sync picture albums from photo-sharing and social media platforms. Supported platforms include Facebook, Instagram, Google Drive & Photos, Dropbox, Flickr, and more. Once you select & sync an album, it’ll be saved to the frame’s internal storage for offline access.
Pix-Star’s albums can be set to automatically update and download any photos that get added to linked albums. Since you can link the same account to several frames, or several accounts on the same platform to one frame, it’s an excellent way to automate sharing photos with the whole family. All you need to do is add the photos you want to share to the linked album and they’ll be synced and saved to all connected digital photo frames.
What to look for in a digital picture frame for families?
Wi-Fi is probably the most impactful digital photo frame feature for families. It lays the foundation for cloud storage & related features, mobile apps & web dashboards that let you send photos from anywhere in the world, and secondary features like radio, weather, and alerts. Without Wi-Fi, the only way to load photos to the frame is by USB/SD card. It also means you can link and connect all your digital photo frames to remotely control & manage them & their storage/settings.
After Wi-Fi, cloud storage is a must. Families produce and share a lot of photos. It’s important to keep these memories safe and easily accessible. Frames like the Pix-Star offer free-for-life cloud storage – though many top frames charge extra recurring fees to unlock or expand cloud storage. Cloud storage also lets you link to and sync photo albums from social media and photo-sharing platforms. These are known as web albums and are incredibly versatile. Learn how to send photos from Facebook to your digital photo frame here.
Make sure the digital photo frame has at least 8GB of internal storage. This ensures there’s enough space to keep all the photos from the rest of the family directly on the frame. You can access this storage while the frame is offline and won’t be reliant on the cloud for full access to your photos, videos, and audio messages. You should also make sure that slideshows offer loads of customizations and let you control the play order and frequency of the photos being displayed. You should also be able to select which folders and sources slideshows are played from.
How do connect & sync all the digital picture frames in the family?
Pix-Star lets you control & manage up to 25 connected Pix-Star frames from a single user account. It’s easily done through the web dashboard. Here you can change all their settings, start slideshows, adjust slideshow settings & sources, update the firmware, and manage cloud & local storage for each connected frame.
To add frames to the web dashboard, you only need their serial number and unique email address. The serial number is found in the frame’s “About” section of the “Settings” page.
How to start slideshows on a digital picture frame for the whole family?
Slideshows can either be started from the Pix-Star frame’s home page or the “Media gallery”. Starting slideshows from the home page include all the photos saved on the frame. It only takes 2-clicks to start and it plays right away.
Starting slideshows from the frame’s media gallery lets you select the files and folders to be included in the slideshow. You can also start slideshows by source (e.g., photos received by email, web albums like Facebook, USB/SD card, etc.).
Do digital picture frames for families need Wi-Fi & cloud?
Wi-Fi & cloud are essential features, especially for bigger families or those that share a lot of photos & other media. Through Wi-Fi, you can send pictures, videos, and audio messages from anywhere in the world. Cloud storage lets all the received photos be automatically backed up. These photos are also able to be centrally controlled via the web dashboard. Pix-Star’s frames offer free-for-life cloud storage and extensive Wi-Fi capabilities – so they’re an excellent digital picture frame for families.
