Your tablet gathering dust? Here are five ways to give it a new life.

Remember a few years ago when tablets were the new got-to-have gadget? Then, over time, people realized that tablets, for the most part, where redundant. Who really wants a device that is smaller than a laptop but slightly bigger than a phone but has all of the same capabilities as a phone? Now most folks have either given their tablets away or they’re languishing in a drawer.

It’s time to give your old tablet a new life. Here are some simple ways to give that old tablet a purpose once again.

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1. Use it as a digital picture frame

Buy a tablet stand, create a slideshow from your favorite pictures and plug your tablet in. Have the slideshow run while the tablet sits on a shelf or on your desk. Remember to disable the sleep mode on your tablet to keep the show running. You can also use an app, like Dayframe, that keeps your stream of photos constantly updated by pulling in new photos from your social media accounts.

1. Make it the ultimate TV remote

You can use your table to run your television by pairing it with SHIELD Android TV, Apple TV or Google Chromecast streaming sticks. Just download the remote app for your streaming stick and you’re good to go. Now you don’t need to use your phone and you have a dedicated, online remote.

1. Control your entire home

Why stop with TV? Use your tablet as a dedicated remote for all of your smart devices and save your phone’s memory. For example, my mega tablet remote runs my SHIELD Android TV, Playbulb Color light and speaker, Xbox One, SmartChef Wifi-enabled smoker, D-Link Wi-Fi security camera and all of the other devices I have all over my home. I’m so glad I have a place for all of those apps, so they’re not clogging up my phone.

1. Lose the cookbooks

My kitchen is a lot smaller than I would like, but I love to cook. I have tons of recipe books that take up way too much precious space. I’ve found a solution, though. Use your old tablet as a digital recipe book by downloading a recipe organizing app. I use MasterCook, which stores and organizes my old recipes and helps me find new recipes. It also generates shopping lists, scales recipes from one person to one hundred, shares foodie photos and computes nutritional information and recipe cost analysis.

1. Turn it into a security camera

Need a security camera for just one area of your home? You can easily turn a tablet into a makeshift security camera. Taylor Martin has a great tutorial for using an old phone as a security camera that would work with an old tablet, as well.

Like these ideas but gave your tablet away, thinking that it would never be used again? Amazon and many other online retailers have slashed the price of tablets down to $35 to $50. Many mobile phone companies, like Verizon, are offering free tablets with the purchase of a new phone, as well.