Apple announces Siri upgrade with enhanced AI integration, redefines voice commands for users

By DR. ITAY GAL

Published: MAY 31, 2024 02:15

Image of person in Canada trying to using Siri in 2011 before it was implemented in the country. Uploaded on 31/5/2024 (photo credit: ASHTON EMANUEL/FLICKR) — Image of person in Canada trying to using Siri in 2011 before it was implemented in the country. Uploaded on 31/5/2024

(photo credit: ASHTON EMANUEL/FLICKR)

Apple plans to upgrade Siri with AI, enabling app operation, voice dictation, web summarization, automated messaging, and AI-driven photo editing. Expected release with iOS 18 at WWDC.

Apple announced plans to significantly upgrade Siri based on Artificial Intelligence (AI) allowing it to operate applications, dictate voice reminders, summarize websites, send automated responses to messages, and even edit photos using artificial intelligence.

Bloomberg reported that the American company Apple plans to integrate AI into the new iOS 18, enabling users to control application functions using only their voice. This change required a rebuild of Siri's core software. The upgrade is expected to be unveiled at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference on June 10.

As part of the launch, Siri will be able to perform searches and answer questions like other AI applications. For the first time, it will also be able to execute commands on iPhones, including opening documents, moving or deleting emails, sending web links via email, summarizing articles, and executing commands within apps, not just opening them as currently possible.

Advanced commands ahead

A women uses an iPhone mobile device as she passes a lighted Apple logo at the Apple store at Grand Central Terminal in New York City, US, April 14, 2023. Uploaded on 31/5/2024 (credit: MIKE SEGAR / REUTERS)

Apple plans for Siri to support hundreds of different commands. However, initially, the updated Siri will handle one command at a time. At a later stage, users will be able to join commands together. For example, they could ask Siri to summarize a recorded meeting and then send a message to a colleague in a single request. Or they could ask their iPhone to crop a photo and then email it to a friend.

The new version of the operating system is likely to be launched in September, around the same time as the next iPhone models. With Siri's upgrade, Apple also aims to revive its voice assistant, after losing the lead to Amazon's Alexa and Google's Assistant, which are considered more advanced.

Many of Siri's new capabilities will require an iPhone Pro 15 or higher, a move Apple tends to promote with each new development to further boost sales of the new devices.