A guide
A Samsung Frame alternative for Apple TV
You can get most of what Samsung's The Frame does on the TV you already own. Plug in an Apple TV and run an art app, and the screen shows a painting all day instead of going black. You won't get The Frame's matte screen or its motion sensor, but you also won't need a new TV or a monthly subscription.
What The Frame does
The Frame is a Samsung TV with an Art Mode. When you are not watching it, it shows a picture. Its screen is matte, so it reflects less light than ordinary glossy glass, and it hangs flat against the wall with an optional bezel that looks like a picture frame. A motion sensor turns the art off when nobody is in the room. The full Art Store catalogue costs $4.99 a month or $49.99 a year in the US.
What an Apple TV can do instead
With an Apple TV and an art app, any television can show art when you are not watching it. The picture fills the screen and stays until you change it, or changes on a timer you choose.
I built Salon for exactly this. It has more than 1,100 paintings, prints, maps and photographs, and I looked at each one and cut it to fill a 16:9 screen in 4K. A picture can hang edge to edge or behind a bevel-cut mat in five colours and three widths, with the time in a corner if you want it. Since version 1.4 you can hang your own photos from iCloud Photos in the same frame. It costs $9.99 once.
What you give up
The Apple TV route gets you the art. The Frame is still ahead on the hardware:
- The screen. Most televisions are glossy, so in a bright room they show reflections that a matte screen would not. Turning the brightness down helps more than you would expect.
- The bezel. You can buy magnetic or clip-on frames for most TV sizes, and they turn a black edge into a picture frame.
- The motion sensor. Your TV stays on and uses power while the picture is up. Most TVs have a sleep timer or an energy-saving mode, and Salon can let the Apple TV screen saver take over when you want the screen to go dark.
- Burn-in. On an OLED TV, a picture left in place for many hours can leave a faint trace. Let the picture change every so often. LCD TVs, including The Frame, are far less prone to it.
Which one is right for you
If you are buying a new TV anyway and want the closest thing to a print on the wall, The Frame is the better choice. If you already own a TV you like, an Apple TV and an art app get you most of the way for a fraction of the price, with no subscription.
How to set it up
- Connect an Apple TV (Apple TV HD or Apple TV 4K, on tvOS 17 or later) to your TV.
- On the Apple TV, open the App Store and search for Salon Museum Art.
- Open Salon and pick a picture. Press the centre of the clickpad to browse the collection.
- In Salon's settings, choose a mat and a clock, and keep Keep Screen Awake on so the screen saver doesn't take over.
More on making a TV look like a picture on the wall: how to display art on your TV.
An Apple TV app. On your Apple TV, open the App Store and search for Salon Museum Art. It is listed as Salon: Museum Art Frame.