Siri AI

Siri AI - the big update in iOS and iPad OS 27 - for some of us

Apple has been adding features to Apple Intelligence incrementally since its launch in 2024 but the feature which is likely to have most impact for many visually impaired users is Siri AI, a major AI makeover for Siri which is rolling out following the launch of iOS 27 in September 2026. A device that supports Apple Intelligence is required for Siri AI. You will need to request Siri AI in Settings / Siri if you aren't prompted to do so when you update to iOS 27.

Siri AI is designed to respond to natural language instructions and requests for information and is now similar to other AI chatbots but it has the added ability to perform tasks within apps and is aware of the content of your screen and your personal information on your phone or tablet. Apple stresses that Siri AI totally preserves your privacy.

The current version of Siri AI is still a work in progress and there are gaps and errors but it can still do a great deal and do it well. The best approach is to experiment; talk to Siri AI the way you would to a human assistant. You will soon discover what it does well and what doesn't work so well yet. So, please try it for yourself, but here are some examples of what it has been able to do for me.

If you receive an email from someone you'd like to add to your contacts, with the mail open on screen you can instruct Siri AI to "add this person to my contacts" and it will create a contact with that sender's name and email address. If that person later calls you on the phone you can instruct Siri AI to "add the last number that called to Ann Smith's contact".

Siri AI can handle much more flexible calendar enquiries such as "what's in my calendar for the remainder of the month.". If Siri AI includes reminders in its response and yu don't want this instruct it not to include reminders. I've found that I sometimes need to prompt Siri AI to speak long responses rather than just showing them on screen.

If you get an email or message about an event you'd like to attend, with the email or message on screen instruct Siri AI to "add this to my calendar".

If you don't understand the content of a screen you can instruct Siri AI to describe it to you.

Siri AI can correct dictation erros in messages you ask it to send.

Siri AI will respond to requests like "what was the last message from Alan?"

Siri AI has a huge world knowledge and will give full answers to questions. Gone is the "I found this on the web. Check it out" response. But please remember that it is an AI and that all AIs can make mistakes.

Your device indexes (and keeps private) all the information it has including your messages, mail, calendar and photos and Siri AI can use this to answer questions quickly. An example might be "where did Jim say we are meeting tonight?" and Siri AI will check for the answer in messages, mail, WahtsApp, etc.

Audible has done a good job of integration with Siri AI. You can ask it to play a specific book in your library or just play my audible book. You can also jumpt back as much or little as you want with requests like "jump back 5 seconds".

I've had mixed results attempting to send email with the current Siri AI and it is often erratic at other email requests but by all means try it. I found Classic Siri pretty eratic with mail but you may have found some things that worked well for you and you may find that these don't work so well in the current version of Siri AI.

VoiceOver users may find that VoiceOver speaks over Siri AI responses. This can be avoided by temporarily muting VoiceOver speech before giving instructions to Siri and then unmuting VoiceOver speech when the Siri AI session is complete. To mute and unmute VoiceOver speech perform a 3 finger double tap or a 3 finger triple tap if Zoom screen magnification is turned on.

If an early version of Siri AI doesn't work well for you it's easy to revert to Classic Siri.

 Back to home page

last updated 30 October 2026