Apple AI just got a major overhaul at WWDC 2026. Here’s the lowdown

Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2026 It had its biggest moment yet for artificial intelligence. This includes a software conference held two years ago when the company first unveiled its own artificial intelligence, which it called Apple Intelligence.

the WWDC The keynote, kicked off by outgoing CEO Tim Cook, aims to deliver on many of the promises the company has made regarding artificial intelligence. The biggest news concerns the emergence of a smarter, AI-powered Siri.

All of these updates will be available with the next generation of Apple software. Most notably in iOS 27. The iPhone software is expected to be widely released this fall, after betas go out this summer. You’ll need an iPhone with the necessary computing power that can run Apple’s AI, so iPhone 16 or later models will be compatiblein addition to two iPhone 15 Pro models.

Siri, Siri and more Siri

Siri is the cornerstone of Apple’s new intelligence, wherever it appears in Apple apps and devices. Apple has promised to use artificial intelligence to make Siri smarter since it launched Apple Intelligence in 2024. It has paid a price for its delays, including A $250 million legal settlement Announced last month. Now, we finally have a clear picture of what Apple’s AI Assistant will be able to do — even if we don’t have a specific release date beyond a “beta later this year.”

For starters, even the name is changing: Meet the new Siri AI. This version comes with its own app and new customizations, including new sounds you can choose from. Siri AI will be present in iPhone, Mac, Watch, CarPlay, and even AirPods.

“This is very much the Siri that Apple first hinted at two years ago, but this time it’s fully realized.” CNET Senior Writer Katie Collins reports. “But the real test — whether it meets the expectations of people who dream of a real PDA — is yet to come.”

Siri AI is more conversational. It remembers what you’ve asked it previously, so you can chat to it as you would a friend — or, more likely, an AI chatbot — and keeps up with a long series of prompts. It can take action to perform searches across your device, web, and ChatGPT. In the example shown at Apple’s WWDC keynote, you can have Siri search the web for information about World Cup matches and send a personalized invitation just to your friends using voice prompts.

Siri AI also gets support from Visual Intelligence, the company’s technology that allows artificial intelligence to interact with photos and videos. It also has enhanced personal context, which means it can use information in your apps — like Calendar, Mail, etc. — to personalize its answers. Siri AI will only be available in English at launch, and may not be available in the EU and China due to regulatory concerns.

Spatial reframing, image editing, and artificial intelligence regression

Spatial reframing may sound like a rubbery piece of jargon, but it’s a new way to literally reframe your images, thanks to visualization technology from the Vision Pro headset. You can touch, drag, and toggle the perspective of the photo as if you were moving the camera — after the photo has already been taken. Artificial intelligence fills in the gaps to create an edited image.

There’s also a new stretch tool that lets you resize any image and have the AI ​​fill in the gaps. It looks similar to Adobe Generative ExpansionIf you have used it. There too New Siri mode in the Camera app. The AI ​​won’t tell you how to take the photo, but it should understand what you’re saying to provide you with more information, identify things, or suggest actions, like splitting a bill while looking at a receipt.

Perhaps the AI ​​update that interests me most is the promised improvement to the cleaning tool. This existing AI editor can remove distracting objects or random photo bombers. It’s great in theory, although I can attest that there were many instances where the removal wasn’t accurate, or the AI ​​replacement wasn’t seamless.

Read more: How to download iOS 27 Developer Beta and try out the new Siri AI

“Our goal in bringing AI to the Photos app is to help photographers enhance their photos in ways that respect the original moment,” Alok Deshpande, Apple’s director of camera and photo software engineering, said in Apple’s presentation. We’ll have to wait and see if that’s the case.

If you want to let AI take full control of your photos,… New photo stadium Ready for you. Apple’s Creative AI Center is getting new AI models to create better images, including, hopefully, more realistic ones. Less dirty in artificial intelligence. It also gets better editing tools, like the ability to highlight specific elements, resize designs, and edit with text prompts.

Siri artificial intelligence and gemini

Google’s Gemini is one of the most capable and popular AI systems on the market — and thus one of Apple’s biggest competitors in this space — but the two tech giants have teamed up to… Building new fundamental AI models For Apple, based on Gemini technology.

These on-device models must be multimodal, meaning they can understand speech, images, and videos in addition to text.

Apple’s biggest selling point for its AI is its promise of privacy. The combination of AI and privacy plus oil and water means they exist Major Privacy Concernsespecially for sensitive tasks related to your finances and health care. When Apple launched its artificial intelligence system in 2024, it did so through… Private cloud computing infrastructureis designed to not store your data or chat logs when they are processed outside the device.

More artificial intelligence

Did you think that was all? Think again. These are just a few examples of other places where Apple is applying its AI:

For more Apple WWDC news — with less AI — check out Apple Health app updates What’s new with Mac 27 Golden Gate.