We’ve been hearing for a while now that iOS 18 is going to be the biggest overhaul of Apple’s mobile operating system in its history, and over time there’s been a steady stream of leaks revealing what we can expect. Now we just have another tasty morsel that lifts the veil a little further on iOS 18.
According to Mark Gurman of Bloomberg in his Power On NewsletterApple will pack iOS 18 with a suite of powerful artificial intelligence (AI) tools that use a combination of on-device processing and dedicated servers packed with Apple’s own chips. This time, Gurman has some claims regarding some of Apple’s most popular iOS apps.
Gurman specifically stated that Apple will “improve Siri’s voice capabilities, giving it a more conversational feel, and add features that help users with their daily lives – an approach the company calls “proactive intelligence.”
We’ll have to wait and see if that “conversational” feel comes close to OpenAI’s recent demos of its GPT-4o-powered voice assistant, which will be rolled out gradually this year. But that’s apparently not the only AI upgrade we can expect in iOS 18.
Apple’s “proactive intelligence” could also include features ranging from “automatically summarizing notifications” to “transcribing voice memos” and “a quick summary of news articles.” According to Gurman, we can also expect slightly more low-key improvements to features like app suggestions and automatic calendar entries.
Not all improvements are expected to be class leading. Gurman also claims that AI-based photo editing is also on the way for the Photos app, but this will apparently pale in comparison to Adobe’s recent developments. Don’t expect anything like the new ‘Ask Photos’ tool in Google Photos either.
Can Apple catch up?
Some of these features will sound familiar to existing iOS users: apps like Calendar and widgets like the Smart Stack already use AI to suggest events and apps, respectively. But any additional improvements will likely be welcomed by Apple fans.
The summary tools could be more important. Based on Gurman’s report, it seems like they’ll lean more toward the kind of generative AI tools we’ve seen from rivals like Microsoft, whose Copilot AI can perform similar tasks. The arrival of these types of features could help Apple close the gap with its competitors — something the company recognizes it needs to do, Gurman said, while executives have apparently admitted internally that they are “playing catch-up.”
That said, Gurman cautions, “I don’t expect Apple’s internal AI announcements to be nearly as impressive as what OpenAI and Google have already shown.” Part of the problem is that Apple only hosts a major software event once a year (at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June), while rivals like OpenAI can release updates much more quickly.
Still, we know that iOS 18 will likely be a big step forward for Apple, with the company reportedly working with OpenAI to integrate ChatGPT alongside its own internal and on-device AI tools. As the world goes crazy for artificial intelligence, Apple needs to take the next steps to be successful.