With iOS 19, Apple actually wanted to take a big step towards artificial intelligence. A central component of this update was to be a significantly improved version of Siri, which would become more natural and conversational thanks to a new AI system. But recent reports show that Apple is struggling with considerable challenges in implementing it. The planned Siri upgrade is being delayed and the further development of Apple Intelligence is also apparently falling short of expectations.
Apple has been investing in the further development of its artificial intelligence for years. In particular, Siri, the company's voice assistant, was to be taken to a whole new level with new technologies. The goal was a more fluid and conversational interaction, similar to that offered by AI models such as ChatGPT. But according to the Bloomberg journalist Mark Gurman things aren't looking good at the moment. Development is being delayed, and some of the features originally planned for iOS 19 will probably only appear with iOS 20 or later. There is also little visible progress in Apple Intelligence. For users, this means that they have to make do with minor improvements for the time being.
Delays in the Siri upgrade
Apple has been working on a new Siri backend for some time, which is intended to combine the previous two systems - one for simple and one for more complex requests. This architecture remains part of iOS 19, but the planned upgrade, which was supposed to make Siri much more talkative, has been delayed. Apple actually wanted to fundamentally improve the way people interact with Siri with this update. In the future, the voice assistant should be able to understand much more context and respond to questions more naturally. But according to Gurman, Apple is having difficulty perfecting this function. The technological implementation is more complex than expected, and AI development is progressing more slowly than planned. The result is that the really noticeable improvement in Siri will probably only come with iOS 20 or even later. For users, this means that Siri will get a new technical basis in iOS 19, but will still be far from a real conversational AI.
Apple Intelligence: Little progress evident
In addition to Siri, Apple Intelligence should also be further expanded with iOS 19. But there is bad news here too. According to internal data from Apple, Apple Intelligence has hardly been used so far. Apparently, the existing functions are not particularly well received by users. This is also reflected in the development. Gurman reports that iOS 19 will not bring any significant improvements in the area of Apple Intelligence. Apple is still busy implementing the already announced functions from previous updates. Therefore, there are hardly any new features for iOS 19 that are directly visible to the user. This means that Apple is currently falling significantly behind the competition in the area of AI. While companies like Google and OpenAI continue to optimize their language models and roll out new functions, Apple seems to be acting rather cautiously. The real revolution in AI on the iPhone is still a long way off.
What's left for iOS 19?
Despite the delays, iOS 19 will bring some new features. The new Siri architecture will be introduced, even if the planned more talkative version is still missing. In addition, Apple is sticking to smaller improvements that were actually supposed to appear with iOS 18. These are now expected to be released with iOS 18.5 in May. Nevertheless, it should be noted that iOS 19 will not be the major update that many users had hoped for. The delay in the Siri improvements and the lack of progress in Apple Intelligence in particular could cause disappointment.
iOS 19 without a major AI revolution: Apple is treading water
iOS 19 brings some technical innovations, but the big highlights are missing for now. The planned Siri upgrade has been delayed and will not be introduced until iOS 20 at the earliest. Apple Intelligence is also making little progress and will not receive any significant new functions with iOS 19. Apple is therefore facing a challenge: While other companies are rapidly developing their AI technologies, progress on the iPhone has so far remained manageable. It remains to be seen whether this will change with iOS 20. Until then, users will have to live with minor improvements. (Photo by Unsplash / rawkkim)
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