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iPad vs Aura, Skylight & Frameo Frames

Thinking about buying an Aura, Skylight or Frameo digital photo frame? Compare them with using an iPad as a photo frame before you spend the money.

Do you really need to buy a digital photo frame?

If you're shopping for a digital photo frame, you've probably narrowed it down to names like Aura, Skylight or one of the many Frameo-powered frames. They're all decent products. But before you spend $100 to $300 on a new device, it's worth asking a simple question: do you already own something better?

If there's an iPad in your house, even an old one gathering dust in a drawer, the answer is almost certainly yes.

What the dedicated frames offer

Let's be fair to the hardware frames first:

• Aura makes premium frames with nice screens, typically in the $150 to $300 range, with unlimited photo storage and no subscription. Photos are uploaded through their phone app to their cloud.
• Skylight is a popular gift choice. You email photos to the frame or use their app, and some of its best features, like video playback and cloud backup, are part of a paid Skylight Plus subscription.
• Frameo is the software inside dozens of inexpensive frames from different brands, usually $50 to $150. Friends and family send photos to the frame from their phones, a few at a time.

The common thread: a fixed screen size around 10 to 15 inches, photos that reach the frame through the company's cloud service, and features decided by the manufacturer.

What an iPad does better

An iPad running Digital Photo Frame App beats a dedicated frame in almost every category that matters:

Screen quality. Even an iPad from several years ago has a sharper, better-calibrated display than most dedicated frames at any price.

Your photos, straight from the source. No emailing photos to a frame, no uploading to a third-party cloud. The app connects directly to your Photo Library, iCloud shared albums, Google Photos, Dropbox and more. Add an album once, and every new photo appears in the slideshow automatically.

Live Photos and video. Your memories gently move. Hardware frames either can't play them or charge a subscription for video.

No subscription, no new hardware. If you already own the iPad, the whole setup costs nothing. Compare that with a $180 frame plus an annual subscription.

Widgets and flexibility. Weather, clock, photo location and date on screen, dozens of transitions, scheduled on/off hours with the timer, and the frame becomes a normal iPad again whenever you need one. Our guide on how to turn your iPad into a digital photo frame walks through the full setup in a few minutes.

It's not only the iPad. The same app runs on your iPhone, your Mac, and your Apple TV, so the biggest screen in your house can be a photo frame too.

Where a dedicated frame still wins

Honesty helps here. A dedicated frame might still be the right choice if:

• Nobody in the house owns an iPad or iPhone, and buying a used one doesn't appeal to you.
• You're gifting it to someone who should never touch a settings screen. Frames like Aura are genuinely plug-and-play for the recipient. That said, an iPad set up in advance works beautifully for this too; see our guide on digital photo frames for grandparents.
• You want many family members to push photos to one frame without sharing an Apple ID or an album. Frameo's send-from-anywhere model is convenient for that, although a shared iCloud or Google Photos album achieves the same thing.

The bottom line

	iPad + Digital Photo Frame App	Aura / Skylight / Frameo
Upfront cost	$0 with an iPad you own	$50 to $300
Subscription	None	None to $39+/year
Photo sources	iCloud, Google Photos, Dropbox, folders	The maker's cloud
Live Photos & video	Yes	Limited or paid
Screen	Retina, up to 13"	Varies, often lower resolution
Also works on	iPhone, Mac, Apple TV	The frame only

If you already own an iPad, try the app before you buy a frame. It's free to download, and ten minutes with it will probably save you a couple hundred dollars. Keep those memories alive! Manuel

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