A First Look at Apple Intelligence and its (Slightly) Smarter Siri

In iOS 18’s latest developer preview, Siri gets a significant upgrade that hints at the future of Apple’s AI capabilities. The most noticeable change? The entire phone glows around the edges when you invoke Siri, a visual cue that sets it apart from previous iterations.

When you invoke Siri, the edges of your screen glow, signaling the AI's active state.

Introduction to Apple Intelligence

A splash screen reintroduces you to the virtual assistant once you enable Apple Intelligence, an early version of which is now available on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max in a developer beta. This update brings meaningful improvements to language understanding and a glimpse of features like screen awareness and action-taking capabilities that are set to roll out in the future.

Enhanced Siri Experience

One of the immediate benefits is the improved interaction with Siri. Double-tapping the bottom of the screen brings up a text box for communicating with the assistant through text. Siri now parses natural language more effectively, patiently handling hesitations and "um"s, and understanding follow-up questions.

Apple Intelligence Features

Outside of Siri, Apple Intelligence features are sprinkled throughout iOS 18 like hidden gems. For instance, the mail app now includes a summarize button at the top of each email, and anywhere you can type and highlight text, you'll find "writing tools" with AI-powered proofreading, writing suggestions, and summaries.

The AI's "Help me write something" function is versatile, allowing you to adjust the tone of your text to be more friendly, professional, or concise. You can also create summaries or synthesize text into bulleted lists or tables.

Improved Notes and Voice Memos

The Notes app now benefits from Apple Intelligence, especially with the addition of voice recordings that come with automatic transcriptions. Although this transcription feature also works on older models like the iPhone 13 Mini, Apple Intelligence allows you to turn a recording transcript into a summary or a checklist. This is particularly useful for organizing thoughts or planning tasks from a recorded memo.

Automatic transcription of voice memos is impressively accurate.

Enhanced Email and Photo Search

The mail app now highlights important emails in a priority card above your inbox, and each email shows a brief summary instead of the usual first line or two of text. The AI accurately summarizes promotional emails, making them more digestible.

In the Photos app, the search tool now uses AI to understand more complex queries. You can ask for pictures of a particular person wearing glasses or all the food you ate in Iceland, all in natural language. The results are fast and generally reliable, showcasing the AI's potential for intuitive and useful features.

Apple Intelligence turns rambling lists into organized tables.

Looking Ahead

Despite these enhancements, Siri remains largely the same for now. The most significant updates, like screen awareness and action-taking capabilities, are still to come. Future updates promise that Siri will be able to grab information from messages and emails and turn them into calendar events or retrieve information without you having to search through your inbox.

Conclusion

The pieces of Apple Intelligence available so far are promising building blocks for a more powerful and intuitive Siri. While the current version offers meaningful improvements, the real excitement lies in the potential for a fully integrated AI assistant capable of understanding and acting on contextual information across your iPhone.

Stay tuned for more updates as Apple continues to refine and expand its AI capabilities, making the iPhone an even more powerful tool in your daily life.

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