Apple has officially unveiled macOS 27 Golden Gate at WWDC 2026, and the update marks one of the biggest changes to the Mac experience in years. While last year’s release focused on introducing the Liquid Glass design language, macOS 27 Golden Gate shifts the focus to artificial intelligence, performance improvements, and smarter system experiences powered by Apple Intelligence.
The star of the update is Siri AI, a completely redesigned assistant that can hold natural conversations, understand personal context, search across apps and files, and take action throughout the operating system. Apple is also bringing Visual Intelligence to the Mac, introducing smarter Safari features, upgrading Photos with powerful AI editing tools, and refining the overall macOS experience with better performance and usability enhancements.
These features are available in developer beta starting today, with a public beta expected next month ahead of a wider release this fall.
Siri AI transforms the Mac experience
Siri AI is the biggest addition to macOS 27 Golden Gate. Powered by Apple Intelligence, the new assistant is designed to feel more like a conversational AI companion than a traditional voice assistant.
Users can ask open-ended questions, brainstorm ideas, research topics, summarize information, and engage in natural back-and-forth conversations. Siri AI can also search across personal content stored on a Mac, including emails, messages, notes, photos, and calendars, helping users find information without manually digging through apps.
Apple says Siri AI can understand personal context and use that knowledge to surface relevant information. Users can ask Siri to find a photo from a past trip, locate a specific email, retrieve a note, or identify details from previous conversations.
A dedicated Siri AI app arrives on Mac
The new Siri app stores conversations across devices, allowing users to start a conversation on their Mac and continue it later on iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, or Apple Vision Pro. Conversations can be revisited later, pinned for quick access, or used as a starting point for new tasks.
This change makes Siri feel much closer to services like ChatGPT and Gemini while remaining deeply integrated into Apple’s ecosystem.
Siri AI works directly with Spotlight
Users can search as normal and choose “Ask Siri” directly from Spotlight results. Apple has also rebuilt search indexing across Spotlight, Mail, Photos, and the broader operating system, making search results faster and more relevant.
The tighter integration means Siri AI can become part of everyday Mac workflows rather than a separate tool users occasionally open.
Visual Intelligence comes to Mac
Users can take a screenshot of anything on their display, including images, PDFs, webpages, documents, or presentations, and ask Siri AI questions about what they see. Siri can provide explanations, search for additional information, summarize content, or perform related actions.
This feature brings Apple’s visual AI capabilities beyond iPhone and could be especially useful for students, researchers, professionals, and anyone working with complex information.
Writing Tools become more capable
Users can ask Siri to generate content from scratch, rewrite existing text, improve grammar, change tone, or provide suggestions. Siri AI can also adapt to a user’s writing style when drafting emails and messages, helping generated content feel more natural and personalized.
The tools work across Apple apps and many third-party apps where users type text.
Siri can take actions across apps
Beyond answering questions, Siri AI can now complete tasks across apps. Apple demonstrated Siri creating reminders, editing messages, organizing photos, managing calendar events, creating notes, controlling music playback, and performing actions in supported apps based on natural language requests.
This deeper integration moves Siri closer to becoming a true digital assistant rather than simply a voice interface.
Safari gets smarter with Apple Intelligence
Automatic tab organization can group related tabs into topics, making it easier to manage research projects, shopping sessions, work tasks, and travel planning.
Safari Notify Me can monitor webpages for changes and send notifications when important updates occur, such as product restocks, price drops, reservation openings, or ticket availability.
Apple is also introducing Describe an Extension, which allows users to create custom Safari extensions simply by describing what they want the extension to do.
Photos gains powerful AI editing tools
Spatial Reframing allows users to adjust a photo’s composition after it has been taken, while the new Extend tool can intelligently expand images beyond their original borders. Apple has also improved the Clean Up tool, making it better at removing large distractions and unwanted objects.
Edited photos generated with Apple Intelligence will include hidden SynthID watermarks to identify AI-modified content.
Image Playground gets photorealistic image generation
Users can now generate photorealistic images alongside artistic styles, create visuals for projects, edit generated images using natural language, and produce content for presentations, wallpapers, contact posters, and creative work.
Apple says the new experience is powered by updated image generation models running through Private Cloud Compute.
Describe a Shortcut lowers the barrier to automation
With Describe a Shortcut, users can simply explain what they want to automate and Apple Intelligence will build the workflow automatically. Users can then make additional changes using natural language rather than manually configuring each action.
This could help bring powerful automation tools to a much wider audience.
Child safety features expand on Mac
Ask to Browse requires children to request permission before visiting new websites. Parents receive approval requests directly in Messages, making it easier to review and approve access.
Communication Safety now helps protect children from viewing violent or graphic content in addition to nudity. Apple has also expanded Time Allowances and Schedules, allowing parents to manage app categories and screen time based on age-appropriate recommendations.
A redesigned parental controls experience in System Settings makes these tools easier to manage.
Liquid Glass gets meaningful refinements
Rather than redesigning the interface again, Apple is refining Liquid Glass throughout macOS. The update improves readability with better contrast, more consistent visual effects, redesigned toolbars, updated menu bar icons, edge-to-edge sidebars, and refined window shapes.
Apple is also adding a new customization slider that allows users to adjust Liquid Glass from ultra-clear to fully tinted, giving users more control over the interface appearance.
Faster performance across macOS
Apple says AirDrop transfers are faster, Safari pages load more quickly, network file browsing feels more responsive, and search results appear faster throughout the operating system.
Combined with broader optimizations across the platform, Golden Gate aims to make Macs feel noticeably quicker during everyday use.
More upgrades across the operating system
macOS 27 Golden Gate includes a long list of additional improvements throughout Apple’s apps and services.
Calendar can now create and modify events using natural language descriptions. Messages and Mail gain contextual suggestions that help users quickly create reminders, events, and notes based on conversations. Call Context can surface useful information from Mail and other apps when contacting businesses.
Maps receives an upgraded Flyover experience with more detailed aerial imagery powered by Visual Intelligence. Shared Albums become easier to use across Android and Windows devices while adding support for full-resolution sharing and new collaboration features.
Apple is also improving the Podcasts experience on Mac, adding swipe-to-refresh support across more apps, enhancing Mail search, and expanding support for ultrawide displays with higher resolutions and refresh rates.
Accessibility improvements
VoiceOver gains richer image descriptions and a better understanding of onscreen content. A new captioning feature can automatically generate synchronized subtitles for videos and translate captions into other languages.
These additions continue Apple’s long-standing focus on making the Mac more accessible for all users.
macOS 27 Golden Gate compatibility
macOS 27 Golden Gate supports:
- MacBook Neo (2026)
- MacBook Air with Apple silicon (2020 and later)
- MacBook Pro with Apple silicon (2020 and later)
- iMac with Apple silicon (2021 and later)
- Mac mini with Apple silicon (2020 and later)
- Mac Studio (2022 and later)
- Mac Pro (2023)
The update officially ends support for remaining Intel-based Macs, making macOS 27 Golden Gate an Apple silicon-only release.
Release date
The macOS 27 Golden Gate developer beta is available now through the Apple Developer Program. Apple plans to release a public beta next month, with the final version launching this fall.
While Golden Gate may not introduce a dramatic redesign, it represents a major step forward for Apple Intelligence on the Mac. Between Siri AI, Visual Intelligence, smarter Safari features, AI-powered photo editing, and meaningful performance improvements, macOS 27 Golden Gate focuses on making everyday tasks faster, easier, and more intelligent.
