New Siri features will probably be included in iOS 18.5
Apple has made announcements about iOS 18.4, but has not revealed anything about the improved voice assistant. Apparently there are delays.
Presentation of Apple Intelligence in the iPhone 16e product video: When will Siri finally get smarter?
(Image: Apple / Screenshot Apple.com)
Rumors that Apple has gone overboard with the implementation of several new Siri AI functions seem to be confirmed. At least this is what yesterday's brief presentation of the new iPhone 16e suggests. Although iOS 18.4 was mentioned, which includes German language support, the planned new, smarter features of the Apple voice assistant were not mentioned. “No mention of AI Siri features in the 16e video or press release,” noted Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman. So it looks like the features – there are at least three – will probably only appear with iOS 18.5, which is now planned for May at the earliest. Apparently, there were technical problems with the implementation.
What could have come in iOS 18.4
Apple did make Siri a little smarter with the introduction of Apple Intelligence in iOS 18.1, so the system should be able to handle natural language better and follow the context across individual sentences. However, the system is still a long way from capabilities like those of ChatGPT. The first major improvements were planned for IOS 18.4. These include the inclusion of personal context via a secure query of the data contained on the iPhone – such as photos, calendar entries, files or iMessage messages – known as on-screen awareness, as well as new in-app actions that Siri should be able to perform.
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Apple even featured “Personal Context”, also known as “Personal Context Understanding”, in a television advertisement with a movie actress back in September (!), although the technology is simply not yet up and running. Apparently, the company thought that the implementation would be faster – or that customers would keep the feature in mind for so long. On-screen awareness, on the other hand, allows Siri to read content from the iPhone screen and then interact with it. However, this in turn apparently requires adaptations to apps, which developers have not yet been able to test due to a lack of beta. Finally, in-app actions allow Siri to perform “hundreds of actions” for the user, according to Apple – in Apple and third-party apps. Here, too, it has yet to be tested how well this works in practice.
Beta test delayed
Developers had expected Apple to release a beta of iOS 18.4 quickly after iOS 18.3 so that they could test the new AI features. However, confusingly, this has not yet happened. It looks very much as though iOS 18.4 will only bring the voice enhancements for Apple Intelligence.
A beta should then be released urgently this week. The iPhone 16e will be available to pre-order from Friday, and Apple will then immediately update it to iOS 18.3.1. It is unclear exactly when iOS 18.4 will be released. However, the new Apple Intelligence languages are not scheduled until April.
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