Apple is behind schedule on its big Apple Intelligence overall of its Siri personal assistant and it may not arrive, as previously expected, in iOS 18.4.
That’s according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, who said the planned update has hit the skids with Apple potentially waiting until iOS 18.5 to launch the features announced in first June 2024.
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The update is scheduled to give Siri, perhaps its biggest ever overhaul with understanding of personal context, awareness of what’s happening on-screen and new in-app actions among the promised upgrades that are the most anticipated of the debut year of Apple Intelligence.
Gurman says Apple could delay some features or limit their functionality for the time being, simply because they don’t work consistently yet. Should Apple wait until iOS 18.5, we’re looking at May or possible June 2025 for the launch of the features.
Apple would surely hope to have them available before it arrives at WWDC in June to preview iOS 19. Otherwise that might be a little embarrassing.
“Internally, the company has been planning to introduce the technology as part of iOS 18.4, the version of its mobile operating system coming in April, Gurman writes. “But now Apple is considering delaying or limiting at least some of the overhaul until iOS 18.5, which will be released as early as May, the people said.”
“Inside Apple, many employees testing the new Siri have found that these features don’t yet work consistently. And it’s nearing crunch time for the software to be ready.”
Too important to get wrong, but iPhone users are right to be annoyed
The rollout and subsequent rollback of Apple Intelligence news summaries before they were ready was a learning moment for Apple. It’s unlikely to repeat that error with the much-grander overhaul of Siri to compete with the likes of Google Gemini and ChatGPT voice. It’s too important to get wrong.
On the other side of the coin, if you bought an iPhone 16 for Apple Intelligence you’ve a right to be peeved about these delays. We’re now half way through the release cycle and this feature doesn’t look like it’ll arrive until June now 10 months after the phone arrived.
