When Will iOS 27’s New Siri AI Features Arrive?
Toggle Dark Mode
While it wasn’t the only thing Apple showed off during yesterday’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) keynote, Siri AI was arguably the biggest. The new evolution of Siri represents not only the fulfillment of the promises Apple made at WWDC two years ago, but goes beyond even those humble ambitions, turning Apple’s 15-year-old voice assistant into a full-fledged AI chatbot — even to the point of giving it a standalone app.
Still, as promising as this all sounds, it also feels depressingly familiar for those of us who sat through Apple’s WWDC 2024 keynote. After all, Apple showed off many of the same things during that presentation, demoing a conversational Siri that could understand personal context by using examples like asking when a friend’s flight lands and arranging an Uber to take you to the airport or schedule a lunch — all without having to spell everything out.
In the months that followed WWDC24, it became increasingly clear that the Siri Apple showed off during that event wasn’t ready for prime time. Even other Apple Intelligence features it unveiled didn’t arrive until iOS 18.1, and the new Siri itself was reportedly even further away, expected to arrive in iOS 18.4 the following spring. Sadly, it failed to meet even that relatively generous deadline, and here we are.
After that, it wasn’t too surprising that many called the original Siri “vaporware,” and reports from insiders suggested what Apple had shown off at WWDC24 was little more than a barely functional prototype — an idea bolstered by the fact that members of the press never got a chance to see even a staged demo, much less play with it themselves.
With all that in mind, we can’t blame you if yesterday’s Siri AI demos left you a bit skeptical. Once bitten, twice shy, as the saying goes. However, there’s every indication that Apple is actually ready to follow through this time. In addition to the demos being more interactive and the very fact that Apple isn’t likely to let itself fail so publicly again, there’s the fact that the company isn’t wasting any time getting Siri ready for iOS 27.
The iOS 27 Beta Reality Check
In stark contrast to the very tentative and staged rollout of Apple Intelligence, nearly everything Apple showed off during yesterday’s keynote is already technically up and running in the very first developer beta of iOS 27. That includes the new Image Playground and Siri AI — although there is a small catch.
As some eleventh-hour rumors hinted, Siri AI is being gated behind a waitlist. While anyone with a registered developer account can install the first iOS 27 beta right now, you’ll have to get in line for the new Siri.
Until you’ve made it to the front of the line, the iOS 27 Siri experience will remain virtually identical to that of iOS 26, right down to the colorful glowing borders when you activate Apple’s voice assistant — as opposed to the Dynamic Island presentation of Siri AI.
For now, you have to opt into the new Siri manually by visiting Settings > Siri (which appears to have been renamed from “Apple Intelligence & Siri”). A Try New Siri button will appear at the top of that section that will walk you through signing up for the waitlist.
It’s unclear how long the wait will be — I signed up last night right after installing the developer beta, and I haven’t passed the velvet rope yet — but iOS 27 claims you’ll be notified when “New Siri” is available (a moniker that unsettlingly reminds me of “New Coke”). Until then, returning to the Siri settings will simply show that you’ve joined the waitlist.
To be clear, the waitlist isn’t just a half-built front-end component in the first beta. Apple has confirmed that “New Siri AI features are available for developer testing starting today,” but it’s obviously not willing to open the floodgates and let everyone in at once. The only beta that doesn’t yet include support for New Siri is watchOS, which Apple says is coming “in a future watchOS 27 beta.”
Unlike the iOS 18 debacle, New Siri is fully expected to launch this fall in iOS 27.0, with a few caveats. For one, we can expect there to be a waitlist even for its public launch, which isn’t too surprising considering we saw the same thing with the iOS 18 AI rollouts. Further, the initial launch will be limited to English languages — although apparently all of the dialects, not just US English — and continue to carry a “beta” tag until Apple feels it’s ready to take the training wheels off.
Lastly, we do have some bad news for folks in the European Union and China. As with the initial rollout of Apple Intelligence two years ago, Siri AI is not coming fully to either of those regions right away.
Apple formally announced that the Digital Markets Act is blocking its rollout on the iPhone and iPad in the EU. This stems from what Apple software chief Craig Federighi highlighted as ongoing compliance challenges regarding privacy and security, though the feature will still land on the Mac, Apple Watch, and Apple Vision Pro across the Atlantic. Meanwhile, Apple is working through separate regulatory requirements to deploy Siri AI in China, which may prove less contentious than the EU gridlock.
