Apple used its WWDC 2024 developers conference to announce that a wide range of AI-powered features will be coming to its devices later this year.
After a slow start in the AI race, Apple products look set to have AI integrated into every part of their functionality.
The company says its “Apple Intelligence” will feature in its new iPhone, iPad, and computer products. If you have an iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, or an iPad or Mac powered by an M1 chip then you’ll be able to use these new AI features.
The new features include summarising, editing, and writing suggestions in apps like Mail. Photo editing tools will allow for object removal, removing strangers from your photos, and generating custom emojis or images from prompts.
A lot of these kinds of functionalities were available in individual apps but with Apple Intelligence these features work across and within apps and become personalized based on your context.
The AI-powered Math Notes iPad app was especially impressive.
iPadOS 18 Math Notes feature is WILD! 🔥🔥
No doubt about this.#WWDC24 pic.twitter.com/ee4Pv9hhcD— AshutoshShrivastava (@ai_for_success) June 10, 2024
A lot of these Apple Intelligence features will run on-device to retain privacy, while more intense AI processing will happen on Apple’s Private Cloud Compute servers.
Siri upgrade
Siri also gets an AI-powered update that enables the voice assistant to understand and respond to more natural language requests and maintain context.
You don’t need to say “Hey Siri” before each request anymore. Now, if you ask Siri a question she stays in the conversation and will respond to follow-up questions. You could ask Siri “What’s the weather in New York?” and once you get a response you could ask, “What flights are available to get there?” with Siri understanding the context of the conversation and what “there” refers to.
Siri will have personalized cross-app capabilities too. Apple gave the example of asking Siri, “When is my mom’s flight landing?”. Siri is able to understand who “mom” is and access the flight data from emails or text messages.
Apple said that Siri will be able to perform complex tasks like finding a photo of your driver’s license in your photo album and then extract the ID number to paste into a form.
This is the best example of Apple’s new AI in everyday life. This could honestly be a gamechanger.#wwdc24 pic.twitter.com/txhxMcb9pM
— Adrian Weckler (@adrianweckler) June 10, 2024
OpenAI partnership
The ChatGPT iOS app has been available for a while now but Apple’s new partnership with OpenAI sees ChatGPT integrated into iOS functionality rather than as a standalone app.
The integration will see GPT-4o enable image and document understanding on iOS devices without jumping between tools.
Users will also be able to ask Siri to use ChatGPT to answer a question or perform a task. Apple has always been fiercely protective of privacy and users will be asked before any questions, documents, or photos are sent to ChatGPT.
In a statement, OpenAI said, “Privacy protections are built in when accessing ChatGPT within Siri and Writing Tools—requests are not stored by OpenAI, and users’ IP addresses are obscured.”
Do you trust OpenAI not to use your phone calls, messages, emails, or other data to train its models? Elon Musk is less convinced.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 10, 2024
In a series of tweets Musk said “Apple has no clue what’s actually going on once they hand your data over to OpenAI.”
He also said, “If Apple integrates OpenAI at the OS level, then Apple devices will be banned at my companies…And visitors will have to check their Apple devices at the door, where they will be stored in a Faraday cage.”
OpenAI’s casual treatment of data might see some adopt Musk’s skeptical view, but the AI features coming to iOS18 look too good to resist.
