Synopsis

Apple unveiled Siri AI at WWDC26, a significant overhaul powered by Apple Intelligence. The new Siri understands personal context across apps and devices, offers web-based real-time answers, and integrates Visual Intelligence for on-screen and real-world analysis. Writing assistance is also enhanced, with the AI capable of drafting, rewriting, and proofreading content.

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One of the headline announcements at WWDC26 was Siri AI, Apple's biggest overhaul of Siri since the voice assistant first launched. Built on the next generation of Apple Intelligence, the new Siri is designed to be more conversational, context-aware, and capable of taking actions across apps and devices.

The biggest shift is Siri's ability to understand personal context. Apple says the assistant can now pull information from messages, emails, photos, notes, and other content stored across a user's devices. During demonstrations, Siri was shown retrieving restaurant recommendations shared in messages, finding hotel booking details buried in old emails, and surfacing specific photos from recent trips.

Apple is also expanding Siri's ability to work across apps. Users can ask Siri to draft emails, edit and share photos, add information to Notes, and perform a broader range of system actions without manually switching between apps. The assistant can also understand what's currently on screen, allowing users to ask questions about content they are viewing and take follow-up actions.

Unlike previous versions, Siri can now tap into web-based information for real-time answers. Apple says users can ask questions on virtually any topic, receive up-to-date information, and continue the interaction through more natural follow-up conversations.

The company has also introduced a dedicated Siri app that stores conversation history and syncs it privately across Apple devices through iCloud. The idea is to allow users to start a conversation on one device and continue it on another without losing context.

Visual Intelligence is becoming a larger part of the Siri experience as well. On iPhone, Siri can analyse what the camera sees and respond with relevant information or actions. Apple showcased examples such as identifying food, providing nutritional information, and helping split bills using Apple Cash. Visual Intelligence is also coming to iPad, Mac, and Apple Vision Pro, where users can ask questions about content on their screens or objects around them.

Writing assistance is another area receiving a major upgrade. Siri can generate drafts from scratch, rewrite text based on prompts, provide editing suggestions, and automatically proofread content as users type. Apple says the assistant can even adapt writing styles depending on the recipient in apps like Mail and Messages.

Under the hood, Apple says Siri has been rebuilt around a new architecture that combines on-device AI models with Private Cloud Compute when additional processing power is required. The company continues to position privacy as a key differentiator, stating that personal data processed through its cloud infrastructure is not stored or accessible to Apple.

Siri AI is available for developer testing starting today across iOS 27, iPadOS 27, macOS 27, and visionOS 27, with a public beta expected later this year on supported devices.

We'll be taking a closer look at Siri AI's real-world capabilities, limitations, and how it compares with rivals such as ChatGPT, Gemini, and Alexa+ in our continuing WWDC26 coverage on ET. Video coverage from the event is also going live on ET.