Apple delays major Siri AI overhaul, eyes 2026 rollout

The delay comes as competition in the AI voice assistant market intensifies, with Google integrating its Gemini AI model into Google Assistant and Amazon launching an AI-powered Alexa, free for Prime members

Apple has officially announced a delay in the much-anticipated rollout of AI-driven improvements to its voice assistant, Siri. Originally slated for 2025, the release of these advanced features is now expected in 2026. While the company refrained from specifying the reasons for the delay, it emphasized its commitment to creating a more personalized Siri capable of understanding users' contexts and performing tasks across multiple apps.

The upcoming update to Siri is part of Apple’s broader push to enhance its AI capabilities. Last year, the company introduced "Apple Intelligence," a set of AI-powered features aimed at improving user interactions. These updates included the ability to summarize emails, clean up cluttered inboxes, and even rewrite messages.

However, the most significant enhancements were designed to make Siri more intuitive and context-aware, enabling the assistant to better manage tasks, such as pulling up recommendations, managing schedules, or retrieving information based on stored data.

Apple balances AI progress with privacy

To support these AI advancements while safeguarding user privacy, Apple is constructing a massive new cloud computing infrastructure that relies on its proprietary chips. Siri already handles a remarkable 1.5 billion requests per day, and this new infrastructure is set to further boost the assistant’s AI performance, making it more effective at processing complex tasks.

The delay comes at a time when competition in the AI-driven voice assistant market is intensifying. Google has already integrated its Gemini AI model into Google Assistant, while Amazon launched an AI-enhanced version of Alexa, available for free to Prime subscribers but priced at $19.99 per month for others.