Apple is working really hard in its race to become a leading player in AI. Apple Intelligence features are coming so hot that they're being released in stages, a few months after the release of iOS 18. And now, a new report says the company is full steam ahead on a new version of Siri that will well beyond the improved and more personal Siri will be available this spring.
According to a report from Bloomberg's Mark Gurman, Apple is creating a new version of Siri that uses more advanced extended language models (LLM), and project employees are calling it “LLM Siri.”
The new Siri will be able to have natural conversations, much like the new advanced voice mode in OpenAI's ChatGPT. It will also allow more sophisticated requests to be processed more quickly.
According to the report, Apple is already testing the new Siri as a separate app on iPhones, iPads and Macs, but it will be released as a replacement for the built-in operating system functionality we know today. The new Siri is expected to be revealed in 2025 as part of iOS 19 and macOS 16, but will not be available at launch. Instead, it will be updated in early 2026 (i.e. iOS 19.3 or similar).
Siri is expected to get a major upgrade in early 2025 as part of iOS 18.3 or 18.4. Although the fundamental AI model will not change, this version of Siri will be able to create a personal profile about you based on your device data (contacts, messages, location history, etc.) in order to “know” you . better. It will also be able to use hundreds of new app intents, which are hooks that third-party app developers can use to allow Siri to perform functions or access data from apps on your iPhone , iPad or Mac.
Next month, Siri will get ChatGPT integration and new visual intelligence features, but is still largely the Siri we've known for years.
The report doesn't specify exactly how the new Siri will work; Apple emphasizes on-device processing for better privacy, speed and reliability. But advanced LLM models are huge, requiring large amounts of processing and a significant amount of RAM. Apple Intelligence's AI models in iOS 18 already require around 2GB of RAM, which is why they need an iPhone 15 Pro Max or iPhone 16 to work (these are the only phones in Apple with 8 GB of total RAM). If Apple is already testing the system on current devices, there's a good chance your current phone will run it, but it may need a live internet connection to do so.
