How to add photos to a Samsung Frame TV

Updated September 17, 2026

Family photos are the reason a lot of people buy a Frame TV, and adding them is easy once you know where the option lives. The steps are the same as for uploading art; what is different with photos is the aspect ratio, the mattes and Samsung’s photo filters, which this guide focuses on.

Add photos with the SmartThings app

1. Open SmartThings → your Frame → Art Mode

   Phone and TV must be on the same Wi-Fi and the same Samsung account. The Art Mode screen shows the Art Store, Favourites and My Collection.

2. Tap "Add your photos"

   Choose photos from your gallery. You can multi-select – a batch of ten uploads in under a minute over a normal Wi-Fi connection.

3. Choose how it is framed

   Because most photos are 4:3 or 3:2, the app offers matte styles that either crop to fill the screen or show the whole photo inside a border (shadow box, modern, panoramic and others). Pick a matte colour close to your wall.

4. Optional: apply a photo filter

   Filters (grain, ink, watercolour-style effects depending on the model year) soften a snapshot so it reads more like a print. They are subtle; a well-lit, uncluttered photo benefits most.

5. Upload, then display

   Tap Upload. Open the photo in My Collection and tap Display on TV, or select it on the TV in Art Mode.

Add photos from a USB stick

For a large batch – a holiday’s worth of photos – copy the JPEGs to a FAT32/exFAT USB stick, plug it into the One Connect box, and in Art Mode go to My Collection → Photos → USB. Select the photos and save to the TV so they remain after the stick is removed.

Getting photos to look right

Crop to 16:9 before uploading. The Frame is 16:9; a 4:3 phone photo either loses its top and bottom or sits inside a matte. Cropping yourself in the Photos app (choose the 16:9 preset) keeps control of what is cut. Full sizing detail is in the dimensions guide.

Use the highest-resolution original. Modern phones shoot at 12–48 MP, more than the Frame’s 3840 × 2160. Share the original, not a “medium” export – messaging apps compress photos badly.

Lower Art Mode brightness and use the warm colour tone. Photos are the hardest content to make look like art, and at default brightness they look like a photo on a TV. The make it look real guide has the settings.

Prefer soft, evenly lit photos. Harsh flash, deep shadows and busy backgrounds all look “TV”. A landscape or a portrait against a plain wall, with a shadow-box matte, looks like a printed photograph.

From an iPhone

Photos in the iPhone Photos library appear directly in SmartThings’ picker. Two things trip people up:

• Images downloaded from the web, email or Etsy go to the Files app. Open the file, tap Share → Save Image, and it appears in Photos.
• HEIC photos upload fine to 2021-and-newer Frames. On older models, set the camera to “Most Compatible” (JPEG) or let SmartThings convert – if an upload fails, that is usually why.

Mixing photos with art

Many owners keep two sets: personal photos for a slideshow, and artwork for when guests come. In SmartThings you can favourite pieces and set several as a slideshow with an interval, so a photo set can rotate through the day. Details in how to change and rotate art. For the art half, painterly pieces made for the Frame – like the photography and landscape collections – sit comfortably next to photos in the same matte.