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Alongside an OLED TV with an anti-glare coating and AI-infused picture upgrades to its Neo QLED lineup, Samsung also dropped a new home audio product that is as eye-catching as the Frame TV.
The aptly named Music Frame is a picture at first glance with a slot to hold a printer photo but contains multiple speakers to produce rich, clear, and surprisingly loud audio. It’s a speaker that can live on your wall or rest on a table disguised as a traditional picture frame.
While it will be launching later this year at a to-be-announced price point, I had the chance to go hands-on and ears-on at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. You can even sign up to lock in your interest and save up to $100 on Samsung’s 2024 home entertainment lineup when it goes up for preorder.
As an oversized square frame, specifically 12.9-inches x 12.9-inches, and at 1.7-inches thick, the Miusic Frame almost resembles that of a shadow box. Just like the Frame TV, which is its bigger sister or brother, it utilizes a “Slim Power Cable” that lets you easily mount it on a wall. If you opt to place it on a table or maybe a nightstand, you can use the built-in easel stand.
I saw both options today, and it can certainly look at home with either. I think it will ultimately depend on the ascetic you’re going for and what photo you place inside. The front plate is held on magnetically; you can pull it off to swap the photo displayed. Unlike Art Mode on a Frame TV, these are physical images that you can print or presumably order from Samsung.
Samsung was displaying two options—one with a large matte around a smaller square image and others with a full size nearly 12.9-inches x 12.9-inches photo inside. The flexibility for multiple sizes is nice, and you could swap imagery out on the fly.
Underneath this art panel is the audio hardware, and after a quick spin of snippets of a few tracks, the Music Frame sounds rich and clear. It’s powered by two mid-woofers that broadcast out the rear and four front-firing speakers that pass through a wave-guide. The latter isn’t exclusive to the Music Frame and is commonly used by Sonos and other speakers to guide sound outwards. It was clearly working as the Music Frame could quickly fill a small hands-on space, but when grouped together, it gets much louder and delivers true stereo.
Related: Samsung's 2024 Neo QLED and OLED TVs majorly step up picture quality
You can connect to it via Bluetooth to play music on the fly, but the Music Frame is designed to play nice with Samsung TVs. I got to hear it paired with Samsung’s Frame TV and the ultra-thin soundbar briefly. Ideally, you could have two Music Frames hooked up as rears or even just near the TV for a wider soundstage. The Music Frame, like Apple’s HomePod or a Sonos speaker, can also read the room to adjust the mix.
I’m eager to spend more time with Samsung’s Music Frame in the future and eventually put it through its paces in a full review. That will come later in 2024, along with Samsung also announcing the price and additional details around this combination of picture frame and speaker.
In the meantime, if you’re interested in the Music Frame, you can sign up to be notified when those details come out, and you can head over here to learn about the rest of Samsung’s home entertainment products planned for 2024.
