You’d need to wait a bit longer if you were hoping Apple would finally launch a smarter, more personalised Siri at this year’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC 25). Despite revealing a number of new updates and features, Apple mainly stayed silent on the Siri front.
While Apple showcased fresh designs like the new “Liquid Glass” look and announced software changes across its operating systems, the much-anticipated AI-powered Siri didn’t cut it. Many expected Apple to roll out improvements, which were first teased at WWDC 24. Siri was promised to become more useful and better at understanding your personal context. That update has now been delayed again.
No new Siri until 2026, says Apple
During the main keynote, Apple’s Senior Vice President of Software Engineering, Craig Federighi, briefly touched on Siri’s absence. He said, “As we’ve shared, we’re continuing our work to deliver the features that make Siri even more personal. This work needed more time to reach our high-quality bar, and we look forward to sharing more about it in the coming year.”
That phrase, “coming year,” suggests that the new version of Siri might not arrive until 2026. In today’s fast-moving AI landscape, where tech companies release updates regularly, that’s a long time to wait, especially when competitors like Google, OpenAI, and Anthropic are launching new tools and assistants at a rapid pace.
Siri’s new version was expected to be Apple’s answer to smarter assistants. The aim was to make Siri more helpful by allowing it to act across apps and respond to more complex requests. It was also supposed to understand personal details like routines, communications, and relationships.
But a report from Bloomberg earlier this year revealed that the in-development Siri wasn’t performing reliably. According to the report, the AI version of Siri only worked correctly about two-thirds of the time, which wasn’t good enough for Apple to launch. These quality concerns were one reason the company decided to delay.
Behind-the-scenes changes and new AI features
In March, Apple confirmed the delay and made internal changes to the Siri team. John Giannandrea, the Senior Vice President of Machine Learning and AI Strategy, was removed from the project. In his place, Mike Rockwell—who previously led the team behind Apple’s Vision Pro headset—was put in charge of Siri’s development.
This move showed Apple is serious about fixing the project, though it also raised questions about whether Apple is falling behind its AI rivals. Investors and tech watchers alike have noticed the gap.
In an attempt to catch up, Apple has partnered with OpenAI. With this partnership, Siri can hand over specific queries to ChatGPT if it can’t answer them. The new version of iOS, iOS 26, will also use ChatGPT to power tools like Image Playground, which allows users to create AI-generated images.
Despite the delay in Siri’s update, Apple still introduced other AI-related features at WWDC 25. These included tools for developers to access on-device AI models, live translation features, improvements to Apple’s emoji creation (called Genmoji), and a visual intelligence upgrade. They also introduced an AI-powered “Workout Buddy” for the Apple Watch, new AI options in Xcode for app developers, and a better version of the Shortcuts app for scripting and automation.
So, while you won’t be talking to a smarter Siri just yet, Apple is putting a lot of energy into building its AI offerings. Whether it will close the gap with its rivals remains to be seen.
