You can now text photos directly to Aura’s digital picture frames

It’s now easier for friends and family who aren’t tech savvy or are struggling with app fatigue to share images via your Aura digital photo frame. As the name of the new “text to frame” feature implies, photos can now be shared to an Aura frame through a text message, and they will be automatically added to your library — but only from people you approve. Allowing others to share photos that automatically appear on your digital picture frames is already a feature Aura offers, but previously, it was handled through the company’s mobile app. The setup, including approving who has sharing privileges, is relatively painless, but it does require others to download the Aura app and create a free account before they can share photos, even if they don’t have a picture frame of their own. That could be a challenge for some people who have pics to share but not a thorough understanding of smartphones, or just enough of an inconvenience that it discourages others. With text to frame, you connect your smartphone’s number to your Aura account using the mobile app during onboarding, or afterward in account settings, and then create a list of approved contacts, using their phone numbers, who are sent invites to contribute. Only photos from preapproved contact numbers will be added to your library automatically, and you can limit where they’re displayed to a single frame or a specific set of frames. The feature is free to use for both the Aura frame owner and the approved contributors, assuming picture messaging is included in the sender’s cellphone plan. However, it’s only available for iOS and Android users with a US phone number.