Apple is reportedly making significant strides in the competitive AI landscape, with an internal chatbot now considered on par with recent versions of ChatGPT. This progress marks a notable shift for the Cupertino giant, which cautiously approached generative AI. While AI chief John Giannandrea previously expressed skepticism, Apple executives are now aggressively pushing to transform Siri into a true ChatGPT competitor, discussing plans to allow the assistant to access and synthesize information from the open web.
However, the journey to Apple’s current AI standing has been challenging. Insiders reveal that Apple’s initial rush to develop AI features after ChatGPT’s 2022 launch led to significant integration issues when attempting to merge Siri’s legacy code with new AI capabilities. Craig Federighi, Apple’s software chief, recognized the profound potential of chatbots early on, spurring an internal directive to infuse iOS 18 with AI-powered features heavily. Despite these efforts, internal tests of Apple’s homegrown chatbot revealed a significant lag behind ChatGPT, prompting Apple to seek external partnerships.
The partnership with OpenAI was a pivotal moment, announced at WWDC 2024, enabling Siri to leverage ChatGPT for queries it couldn’t handle. This integration, initially slated for an earlier release, was pushed to December 2024, and other promised AI features remain unreleased, leading to public disappointment and even legal challenges. Giannandrea, who reportedly favored Google’s Gemini over ChatGPT, faced internal criticism for his perceived lack of urgency regarding generative AI, ultimately leading to his replacement by Mike Rockwell, the head of Vision Pro, in March.
A major technical hurdle in Siri’s evolution was its fragmented code infrastructure. Engineers had to split Siri’s core to integrate new AI features, leading to system instability when trying to merge these advancements with existing functionalities. To address this, a dedicated team in Zurich is now developing a new software architecture, “LLM Siri,” built entirely on a large language model (LLM)-based engine. This ambitious undertaking aims to make Siri more conversational and adept at processing complex information.
Looking ahead, Apple has ambitious plans for Siri’s future, aiming for a more uniform design experience across iOS 19, iPadOS 19, and macOS 16, inspired by visionOS. While a “SiriGPT” or a fully realized Apple chatbot might not be unveiled at WWDC 2025, the company is reportedly adopting a more cautious approach to feature announcements.
The ongoing development of the Siri LLM version, reportedly being built from scratch by the Zurich AI team, signifies Apple’s commitment to catching up in the AI race. This includes exploring data collection through differential privacy technology and potentially integrating online data, similar to AI search engines like Perplexity, to enhance Siri’s chatbot capabilities.
(via Bloomberg)
