In iOS 18’s latest developer preview, Siri receives a major update. When you invoke Siri, the edges of the phone glow, making it clear that Siri is active. A splash screen reintroduces you to Siri when you enable Apple Intelligence, currently available on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max in a developer beta. This glow around the screen indicates that Siri is listening, making it obvious that something different is happening.
Enhancements to Siri’s Capabilities
The big Siri AI update is still months away, but this version comes with significant improvements to language understanding. Future updates will add features like awareness of what’s on your screen and the ability to take action on your behalf. For now, the improvements in this update are practical. You can tap the bottom of the screen twice to interact with Siri through text. Siri is also better at understanding natural language, waiting more patiently through hesitations, and following up on questions.
Apple Intelligence Features
Outside of Siri, Apple Intelligence features are sprinkled throughout iOS 18. In the mail app, there’s a summarize button at the top of each email. Additionally, where you can type and highlight text, there are new “writing tools” with AI proofreading, writing suggestions, and summaries. These tools allow you to make your text more friendly, professional, or concise, create summaries, or synthesize text into bulleted lists or tables.
These writing tools are especially useful in the Notes app, where you can now add voice recordings with automatic transcriptions. Apple Intelligence can turn these transcripts into summaries or checklists, making it easier to organize your thoughts and tasks.
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Enhanced Mail and Photos Apps
The most obvious new AI features are in the mail app. Apple Intelligence highlights important emails in a card marked as priority and provides brief summaries of emails, making it easier to scan your inbox. These summaries are accurate and helpful, and the emails marked as priorities are genuinely important.
The search tool in the Photos app now uses AI to understand more complex requests. You can ask for pictures of a particular person wearing glasses or all the food you ate in Iceland, all in natural language. This feature is intuitive and useful, quickly finding relevant photos.
Apple Siri’s Future Potential
Despite the visual enhancements, Siri’s core functionality remains similar. It’s still mainly a tool for finding information online. The most significant updates are expected in future releases, where Siri will gain awareness of what’s on your screen and be able to take action in apps for you. This means Siri could turn messages into calendar events or retrieve information from emails without you having to search through your inbox.
These upcoming features are the most exciting, as they will build on the current capabilities of Apple Intelligence. By understanding the contents of emails and photos and better understanding natural language, Siri could become much more powerful and useful.
Conclusion
The iOS 18 beta introduces several exciting updates, especially for Siri. With the new glow effect and improvements in language understanding, Siri is becoming more user-friendly and visually engaging. Apple Intelligence features, such as AI writing tools and enhanced search capabilities, add significant value to the iPhone experience. While the most groundbreaking updates are still on the horizon, these early enhancements lay the foundation for a more intelligent and capable Siri. As Apple continues to innovate, users can look forward to a more intuitive and efficient interaction with their devices.
