A Long-Promised Siri Overhaul Is Arriving Late—and in Beta
Apple’s next big Siri overhaul has been “in the cooker” for years, but it still may not be fully ready when iOS 27 lands. Reporting from Mark Gurman indicates that the upgraded Apple AI assistant is expected to debut with iOS 27 under a prominent beta label, echoing how Siri first launched back in 2011. That beta tag could persist even on the public release this fall, not just in developer builds, underscoring how far Apple still has to go to match today’s leading AI assistants. The refreshed Siri is part of Apple’s broader conversational AI push, with WWDC in June shaping up as the main reveal moment. Behind the scenes, Apple is emphasizing privacy as a key differentiator, including options such as auto‑deleting chats after 30 days or a year, instead of keeping conversations indefinitely by default.
Siri’s New Grammarly-Like AI Writing Tool Explained
Central to the upgrade is a new Siri AI writing tool that works much like Grammarly. When users compose text, Siri will surface suggested revisions at the bottom of the screen, offering options to accept changes one by one, accept all, or reject all. This brings AI writing capabilities directly into the system, rather than forcing users to rely on third‑party apps for polishing emails, posts, and documents. Alongside this sits “Write With Siri,” a keyboard-level feature designed to generate full texts, emails, or even essays on demand. Together, these tools shift Siri from a mostly voice-driven assistant into a proactive writing companion that lives wherever the iOS keyboard appears. For Apple, this is a visible attempt to close the AI feature gap with rivals that already blend generative text and on‑device assistance in everyday productivity tasks.
Prompt-Built Shortcuts and AI Wallpapers Expand iOS 27 Features
Beyond writing, iOS 27 features are expected to lean heavily on prompts. Users will reportedly be able to describe what they want to automate in plain language, and Siri will generate Shortcuts based on that description. This marks a major evolution from today’s Shortcuts system, which typically requires developers to define actions and routes them through Apple’s approval process. If it works well, it could make automation far more approachable for everyday users. Another expected change is native support for AI wallpapers. Instead of relying on third-party apps, users would generate custom lock and home screen backgrounds directly within iOS using AI. Both additions signal an operating system that is increasingly personalized, where the Apple AI assistant doesn’t just answer questions but also designs the way the device looks and behaves around individual preferences.
Under the Hood: Chatbot-Like Siri, Gemini, and Privacy Controls
The next-generation Apple AI assistant is also set to behave more like modern chatbots. Siri will support richer text interactions alongside voice, maintain better context across turns, and even handle stacked requests inside a single command, parsing and responding to each part in sequence. To power this, Apple has reportedly turned to Google Gemini as the underlying AI model, with Google receiving USD 1 billion (approx. RM4.6 billion) a year for the partnership. At the same time, Apple is trying to preserve its reputation for privacy. Users will reportedly control how long Siri stores their conversations, including a limited-memory option that automatically purges data after a set period. These settings, combined with local processing where possible, are intended to distinguish Apple’s approach from competitors that lean more heavily on persistent, cloud-based data retention to train their AI systems.
Why Apple’s Slow Rollout Shows the Pressure of the AI Race
Despite the ambitious feature list, the fact that Siri’s overhaul is likely to ship as a beta highlights Apple’s struggle to keep pace. Competitors have already normalized AI copilots that write emails, summarize calls, and reconfigure phones through natural-language prompts. Apple, by contrast, is only now delivering comparable AI writing capabilities, prompt-built automations, and chatbot-style conversations. The delayed rollout reflects both the complexity of building a privacy-centric assistant and the risk of falling too far behind in expectations. WWDC is poised to be Apple’s chance to demonstrate that Siri can finally live up to the company’s early promises, backed by heavyweight models like Gemini and deep integration into iOS 27. Whether the experience feels polished enough—despite its beta label—will determine if users see Siri as a serious AI partner or just another incremental update.