- Apple’s much-anticipated Siri upgrade is rumored to arrive in ‘spring 2026’
- A new report from Mark Gurman at Bloomberg claims Apple Intelligence-powered Siri is slated for an iOS 26.4 release
- A year is a long time in the world of AI. Is that too long to wait?
As WWDC 2025 comes to a close, a new report claims Apple‘s major Siri upgrade, powered by Apple Intelligence, is expected to launch in ‘spring 2026’.
According to Mark Gurman, writing for Bloomberg, Apple has “set an internal release target of spring 2026 for its delayed upgrade of Siri, marking a key step in its artificial intelligence turnaround effort.”
Earlier this week, the company showcased the future of iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and Vision Pro software, changing the naming scheme to match the year the OS corresponds to. The “26” moniker of iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, and visionOS all include AI features, yet Apple’s most anticipated one is still missing.
Gurman claims the Siri upgrade, which will allow the voice assistant to have on-screen awareness and personal context, is now slated for iOS 26.4, which, based on previous software releases, should arrive around March or April next year.
Gurman’s sources told him an exact date hasn’t been set internally, “beyond a spring time frame.” It’s also worth noting this time frame could shift, especially considering AI-powered Siri was supposed to launch as part of iOS 18 and was initially unveiled at WWDC 2024.
Is the Siri turmoil over?
The last year has been rocky for Apple, to say the least. The Cupertino-based company showcased Apple Intelligence back in June 2024, highlighting how “AI for the rest of us” was going to change the way iPhone users interact with their smartphones.
Unfortunately, the Apple Intelligence features that have launched, such as Genmoji, Writing Tools, and Visual Intelligence, have all received a somewhat lukewarm response as users wait in anticipation for the truly groundbreaking AI Siri that was promised.
My colleague Lance Ulanoff spoke with Apple’s Senior Vice President of Software Engineering Craig Federighi and Apple Global VP of Marketing Greg Joswiak following WWDC 2025’s keynote earlier this week.
During the interview (which you can read about and watch here), Federighi said, “We set about for months, making Siri work better and better across more app intents, better and better for doing search,” Federighi added. “But fundamentally, we found that the limitations of the V1 architecture weren’t getting us to the quality level that we knew our customers needed and expected.” This led to Apple postponing the release of Siri’s major upgrade in March of this year.
Now, we’ve got a clearer idea of when to expect Siri’s Apple Intelligence overhaul, although that’s almost another year away, and a year in the world of AI is an incredibly long time.
By ‘spring 2026’, will Apple’s competitors like Google and OpenAI have opened the gap even wider? And if so, will Apple have put all this effort into an AI solution that just becomes bloatware on an iPhone as users opt to use Gemini Live or ChatGPT Advanced Voice Mode instead?
‘Spring 2026’ is just an estimate, but that has to be the latest possible arrival for a much-needed Siri upgrade; any further delays, and I think Apple’s loyal user base might get even more frustrated with Tim Cook and co.
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john-anthony.disotto@futurenet.com (John-Anthony Disotto)
