Digital photo frames have come on in leaps and bounds since their inception. In 2024, the best digital photo frames will look like design pieces in your home, and come packed with tech to make your photos look as good as possible.
Designed to look like standard photo frames, the devices can be propped up on a shelf or desk, or you can hang them on your walls, to display all your favourite photos on a loop within a single frame. The clever devices make ideal gifts for loved ones, as you can preload them with meaningful photos – gaining you serious brownie points from grandparents or distant friends and family.
When it comes to choosing the best digital photo frame, you’re going to want to think about storage as well as the aesthetic. Some photo frames come with local storage – meaning you can slot a memory card or USB drive (loaded with your photos) into the back of the frame. This is great if you have privacy concerns, and tends to be a more budget-friendly option, but it makes it more of a faff to update your photo selection.
Alternatively, you could opt for a cloud-based photo frame – upload your photos, via an app, to the cloud, which then beams the images into your frame. This means you can change and add to your selection with ease, and invited friends and family can add photos to the mix remotely, too.
Plus, a selection of digital frames can do a lot more than show you a carousel of your favourite photos. The Amazon Echo show and Google hub, for example, have built-in voice assistants and can even display on-demand streaming services, such as Netflix and Amazon Prime.
How we tested the best digital photo frames
We spent a few months putting these devices to the test in our homes. Of paramount concern was how they looked in situ – we wanted something that enhanced our lives and homes as well as made our photos look great. Of course, we were mostly focused on them as photo frames, but we looked at how useful the multipurpose screens were, too. Lastly, we looked at value for money – did the product justify the price tag? Here are the ones that put us in a good frame of mind…
The best digital photo frames for 2024 are:
Aura carver smart HD digital picture frame
We were wowed by how easy this frame was to set up. In fact, if you’re giving it as a gift, you can even pre-load it with images for maximum thoughtful points. Everything is done through Aura’s super sleek app, which lets you see what’s being displayed, all of the photos uploaded and you can add photos remotely.
This is especially lovely for those with loved ones far away, as more than one person can access the frame’s app and then upload photos to their heart’s content. After testing, we gifted this frame to our parents, who have family living on the other side of the world, and it brought so much joy to them to see their far-away family pop up on a screen in their living room. The screen quality is incredible, with eye-popping detail. The screen also pairs portrait photos together, to appear side by side, and this feature is extremely intelligent.
Buy now £129.00, Amazon.co.uk
Aeezo wifi digital picture frame
This touchscreen display is so easy to set up – the screen does all the work for you, connecting the frame to your wifi via an app on your phone. You can also invite friends and family to send their photos, using a code the screen gives you. The HD screen means clear, crisp images (depending on your photography skills) with every detail shown.
The frame itself is perhaps not as high-spec as others in this round-up and doesn’t exude style, but it’s still good enough quality to make the cut. As well as an impressive 16GB of internal memory (that’s going to give you around 40,000 photos), you can boost that using an SD card, which you can plug into a dedicated slot on the frame.
Buy now £55.99, Amazon.co.uk
MyFirst frame doodle
The MyFirst frame is designed for kids to share photos – either in their own homes or the homes of their loved ones. The idea is that kids sign up to the MyFirst app, from which they can upload images to the frame to share with trusted contacts. This is great if kids want to share their latest achievements and events with family members – our seven-year-old loved the idea of beaming their latest artwork to their grandparents’ house.
This device can also display video – you can send video messages to other people’s frames. The frame has been designed to be customised, and it comes with stickers to adhere to it. You can even draw and paint on it, which could make a really sweet gift for loved ones.
Functionality-wise, we found the app clunky – perhaps because the developers have been at pains to make it easy for kids. Uploading photos took us a while to get to grips with, even though we like to think of ourselves as tech-savvy.
The screen is anti-glare – you can still see photos pretty well even when the device is in a sunny spot. We also liked that it had a motion sensor, and switched on when you walked past – you can switch this off, though.
Buy now £99.99, Uk.myfirst.tech
Skylight frame
This modern photo frame is on the larger size, which is great for showing off your photos in all their glory but we found it hard to fit onto our bookshelf – it’s better suited to the top of a sideboard or similar. It also meant that in portrait mode (which is how we take most of our photos), it feels very tall, so perhaps landscape is better for this frame. The screen does auto-rotate photos, though, and, as it’s a touchscreen, you can pinch the photos to crop and zoom in.
We loved the quality of this frame – it’s robust and sturdy, while the black frame is modern, and we liked the white mount around the screen. Our photos looked fantastic on this device, with true-to-life colours on the display. You can set this frame to gift mode and preload it with photos, which makes for a really thoughtful present for loved ones.
There is also a subscription option with this frame – without it, you can still upload photos via email or the app but, if you pay for the subscription, you can opt to add captions to images, have your photos backed up, create albums and even create animated messages using doodles.
Buy now £127.20, Amazon.co.uk
Vieunite textura digital canvas
The 27in display on the Vieunite Textura dwarfs the other frames in this round-up by some way. It’s designed to show works of art – the easy-to-use app gives you a great range of famous works of art from the most famous galleries around the world. From photography to abstract bold prints and still lifes, there are plenty of styles of artwork to choose from. You can, of course, opt to display your own photos, too – you’re able to choose from displaying one photo or having a carousel of images.
It’s likely you’ll be wall mounting this one but it requires connecting to the mains, so, it needs to be placed near a plug socket and will have a cable hanging down all the time. However, the frame is solid and the screen doesn’t look like a screen at all. You can see the texture of each painting as if it was really hanging in your living room.
During the day, the screen looks fantastic – the anti-glare means that even in bright sunlight, you can still see the art or photo. Once the light dims, the backlight makes your images stand out even more. We love that this frame gives us the ultimate flexibility in what we display on our wall – ideal if you’re indecisive or just like to switch up things every so often.
Buy now £599.00, Vieunite.com
Aura carver mat wifi connected picture frame
The bevel on this photo frame is tiny, and there is a “mount” inside the frame, with the result being a modern-looking and hyperrealistic frame. Visitors to our house couldn’t believe it was a digital photo frame when they first saw it.
The carver mat enjoys all the same features as the carver (our overall winner in this round-up). It’s amazingly easy to set up and upload your photos – you have the option of preloading it with images if you’re gifting the frame to someone else.
A landscape-only frame, it intelligently pairs portrait photos together. There’s a built-in speaker for video, and it also adjusts the brightness of the display, depending on how bright it is in the room. If the lights go off entirely, the frame switches off, saving you energy.
Buy now £179.00, Auraframes.co.uk
Hyjoy digital picture frame
We were impressed by the resolution on this mid-priced frame. It brought our pictures to life beautifully, and everything looked pin-sharp in the display. The device features a touchscreen, and it guides you through the setup, which we completed in a matter of minutes, before embarking on an uploading frenzy.
Uploading images is done via an app, which compresses your photos and then, as we understand it, diverts them back to your 8GB local memory. If you’re a real stickler for sharp images and feel your image quality is of paramount importance, you might find this compression affects your photos but, hand on heart, we didn’t notice (and we consider ourselves quite fussy).
You can issue friends and family with a code that lets them upload photos remotely, too (if they download the app). The app also lets you add captions to your photos, if you want, or you can just leave them blank. The frame also displays the time and weather in the corner. As you can use this device in portrait or landscape mode, it’s a good flexible choice. The frame will auto-rotate any photos that are in the other orientation, too.
Buy now £125.82, Amazon.co.uk
Amazon Echo show 15 smart display
We have fallen hook, line and sinker for this frame. You can mount it on the wall in either portrait or landscape orientation, or display it in a stand (sold separately). It’s big but, interestingly, the resolution isn’t as impressive as some of the other options in this round-up. However, setup is a total breeze via the Alexa app, and you can then upload photos via the app onto the screen.
What really blew us away with this frame, though, is how quickly it integrated into and enhanced our lives. As well as displaying our photos, we customised our home screen with Alexa’s widgets, to display a note, an optimistic to-do list, the weather, our calendar, our Spotify playlist and our shopping list. It’s big enough that you can clearly see everything from across the room.
We also use it to play our music, listen to the radio and control our smart home. You can sync it with some home security cameras and video doorbells, too, to check up on what’s going on across your house. Basically, we’d be lost without it – and all our visitors admire it.
Buy now £299.99, Amazon.co.uk
Aura mason luxe smart digital picture frame
Aura claims this frame is “best in class” for screen resolution, and when looking at the figures, we can’t argue. The 2K resolution is so sharp it feels like you can reach into the photo. The backlit feature helps with this, too – all the colours look almost iridescent. Plus, the chunky frame is modern and looks really nice on our shelves – like a standard photo frame rather than a bit of tech.
Setup is easy with Aura’s easy-to-use app, and we were able to quickly ping photos into the frame. Aura even provides everyone with unlimited storage on its secure server, though, you can also use the app to adjust the slideshow speed and shuffle the order of photos. Amazingly, this frame also has a built-in speaker, so you can hear audio on any videos you upload.
If you really love your photos or have some seriously good photos to display, this frame is going to do you proud.
Buy now £229.00, Currys.co.uk
Google Nest hub max
This hub is wildly easy to set up. The touchscreen interacts with a Google Home app on your phone, guiding you through the process without you really needing to do much. Having said that, we found getting it to display photos a bit of a head-scratcher at first.
Firstly, you need to ensure you have some photo albums set up in the Google Photos app, then you let Google Home know which of those albums to display on your screen. Once this is done, it sends the photos to be the background on your Google Nest hub max screen. Got it?
The screen itself is HD and is capable of true-to-life colours, and our images looked pin-sharp. We were very impressed. This screen also offers voice assistance; you can watch Netflix and YouTube on it; control your smart home, and more. You might enjoy that the screen also recognises your face, and displays things it thinks you’ll be interested in – creepy or amazing? You decide.
If you’re already integrated into the Google ecosystem, this will fit neatly into your life and make the most of the services you’re already using.
Buy now £219.00, Argos.co.uk
Amazon Echo show 10
The unique selling point of this device is it follows you around the room. The screen tracks you as you move, and spins on its base, so you always get a good view. We placed ours on the kitchen island, and we liked that, no matter where we moved to in our kitchen, we could still see the screen.
It will display a selection of your photos, which you nominate via the Alexa app, on your home screen – but it does have the tendency to add recipes and news alerts into the mix, too. Fine if you don’t mind that but, if you only want photos, we struggled to work out how to stop the other stuff from pinging up.
When images were displayed, they looked decent on the screen. The colours were perhaps not as vibrant as on other devices we tested, but they still delivered that “aww” feeling as they popped up. As well as photos and recipes, you can pull up Netflix, listen to the radio (the speakers are excellent) and, of course, watch Amazon Prime Video.
We got very attached to this screen during testing, and think it’s perfect for busy families who need a Swiss Army knife of a screen.
Buy now £259.99, Amazon.co.uk
Nixplay 10.1in touch screen photo frame
Nixplay has tweaked its 10in screen with this version. The difference is this one has modifications to improve the video display. You can upload 5GB of videos to the cloud and have them play on your frame – with improved sound, thanks to the upgraded speakers. In a world of TikTokkers and YouTubers, where video is king, this is a great option. That’s why we’ve declared it best for Gen Z.
If you’re a touch too old for TikTok (you’re really not though, give it a whirl!), this is still a great frame packed with some high-spec features. You can pull in photos from Google Photos as well as social media and your phone’s camera roll, via the app. You can also have friends and family add their photos and videos remotely. The Nixplay was easy to set up and had a screen capable of sharp pictures and eye-popping colour.
Buy now £151.99, Nixplay.co.uk
Amazon Echo show 8
This is Amazon’s smallest digital display, which makes it a great option if you’re limited in space or don’t want a huge lit-up screen dominating your room. Ideal for a bedside table, we’d say. As with all Echoes, it’s easy to set up via the Alexa app, and we were able to send photos to the screen in no time.
The screen itself is landscape, and the majority of our photos are phone-snapped portrait orientation, but the device will flip the images around. The resolution competes well against any other in this round-up, and it has loads of other features, too: Netflix, Ring, Spotify, BBC Good Food – the list goes on. It will even tell you a bedtime story, via Audible.
Buy now £94.99, Amazon.co.uk
Digital photo frames FAQs
Which brand of digital photo frame is best?
There are two big brands in the digital photo frame biz: Aura and Nixplay. They produce the best digital photo frames in terms of picture quality, features and size of the canvas. Nixplay’s photo frames have artificial intelligent smarts that can focus on faces, while Aura’s frames are just beautiful to have in the home, with portrait photos being displayed side by side. Digital photo frames from both brands are smart, so you can upload photos straight from your phone.
Aeezo is a fairly new digital photo frame brand that offers more budget-friendly options. Amazon and Google also make digital photo frames, but they’re considered “smart displays” because their main purpose isn’t to display photos.
Do you need wifi for a digital photo frame?
While most digital photo frames are smart and wifi-compatible, meaning you can upload photos directly from a cloud storage service such as Google or Dropbox or directly from the manufacturer’s app, you don’t necessarily need a wifi connection to use these types of devices. Most of the digital photo frames on our list have a slot for an SD card, so you can import photos to the device without having to connect to the internet.
How do you load pictures onto a digital photo frame?
The easiest way to upload pictures onto a digital photo frame is to download and use the brand’s app. Aura, Nixplay, Aeezo, Google and Amazon all have their own individual apps that allow you to transfer photos from your phone’s library directly to the photo frame, over wifi. Most brands also have a browser uploader if you’d prefer to transfer photos from your PC or Mac, and both Aura and Nixplay’s photo frames have either a USB or SD card slot, if you’d prefer to upload offline.
Is it worth buying a digital photo frame?
If you want a way to display hundreds of photos in one single frame, a digital photo frame is an excellent investment. Some even double up as smart speakers, enabling you to play music and ask questions. They make great gifts and there is a huge range of styles to choose from. It’s the most modern way of showing off your pictures in your home.
The verdict: Digital photo frames
We’re totally in love with the Aura carver – it’s slick, easy to use, looks great on our bookshelf, and, most importantly, really showcases our photos beautifully. If you’re looking for something with even more impact, the Vieunite frame is absolutely breathtaking – but expensive. If you have a smaller budget, Hijoy is a great bet – it’s simple but gets the job done well.
Bring your memories to life with the best photo printers
