From Power Feature to Pain Point
Shortcuts has long been one of the most paradoxical parts of the iPhone experience. On paper, it’s enormously powerful: users can chain together actions from multiple apps to build time‑saving, multi‑step automations. In practice, many people bounce off it almost immediately. The interface is dense with functions, nested menus, and obscure commands that feel more like a low‑code developer tool than a mainstream consumer feature. Even common tasks, like combining photos with text or scheduling a recurring reminder workflow, demand fiddly, step‑by‑step construction. The learning curve becomes even steeper when third‑party apps enter the mix, where extra restrictions and inconsistent integrations often derail what seemed like a simple idea. As a result, Shortcuts has remained a niche playground for power users while the average person either downloads a few gallery templates or ignores the app entirely.
Natural Language Shortcuts Powered by Apple Intelligence
Apple’s upcoming overhaul aims to solve that complexity by letting people describe what they want in plain English and letting Apple Intelligence do the rest. Instead of manually assembling actions, conditions, and variables, users will be able to say something like, “Every weekday at 7 a.m., send me a summary of my calendar, today’s weather, and my top three reminders,” and the system will automatically build and install the shortcut. Bloomberg reports that this version is already in testing, effectively replacing the old, manual creation flow with an AI‑assisted one. This shift reframes Shortcuts from a visual scripting tool into a conversational assistant that understands goals rather than individual steps. For many iPhone owners who previously found the app intimidating, it could be the first time automation feels approachable instead of overwhelming.
A Usability Overhaul for iOS Shortcuts
The change goes beyond a single new feature; it represents a fundamental usability rethink for Shortcuts. Up to now, Apple Intelligence automation inside the app has been limited and somewhat awkward to integrate, even though users could choose between on‑device models and cloud‑hosted ones running on Apple’s private servers. Building anything meaningful still required understanding the existing action library and wiring pieces together manually. With natural language shortcuts, the AI becomes a translator between human intent and Shortcuts’ underlying logic. Users only need to know the flow they want and the end result they care about. The system handles the hidden wiring, from setting triggers to choosing compatible actions across apps. That should dramatically reduce the trial‑and‑error that currently plagues shortcut creation, especially for more complex, multi‑step workflows that span several apps and data sources.
Making Automation Truly Mainstream
This move also has broader implications for how people think about automation on their phones. Until now, tools like Shortcuts have effectively required a quasi‑developer mindset, favoring users comfortable with logic blocks and abstract actions. By layering AI‑powered automation on top, Apple is lowering the bar so non‑technical users can participate. If describing a workflow becomes as natural as sending a message, everyday tasks—like organizing receipts, logging workouts, or sharing meeting notes—can be automated by people who would never touch a traditional scripting interface. Apple is also aligning Shortcuts with the wider AI ecosystem, where rivals such as Claude, ChatGPT custom GPTs, and Google’s Gemini already convert natural language into complex behaviors. The difference here is tight integration with system features, making iOS shortcuts feel less like a separate toolkit and more like a native superpower available to everyone.