Apple's Siri upgrades delayed, may arrive early next year

Despite Apple's efforts to improve Siri and compete with rivals like Google Assistant and ChatGPT, the virtual assistant has fallen behind. At the recent WWDC event, Apple unveiled an extensive Siri overhaul, sparking hope among users. However, the exact release date of these upgrades remained undisclosed, SSP reported.

According to Bloomberg journalist Mark Gurman's Power On newsletter, we shouldn't expect the new and improved Siri anytime soon. Gurman suggests that the release of the new features may be delayed until early next year. Previous reports from Gurman indicated that certain abilities of Siri would not be ready for the anticipated iOS 18 release in September and might launch sometime in 2025. Apple has yet to confirm the exact timing for these changes.

However, Gurman may have shed some light on Apple's schedule now. In his report, he mentions that Siri's features are likely to enter beta testing for developers in January and debut publicly in the spring, as part of the iOS 18.4 upgrade. This implies that users might have to wait until March, April, or perhaps even May to experience the new Siri capabilities firsthand.

The schedule outlined by Gurman primarily focuses on some key abilities of Siri, such as controlling in-app features for the first time (e.g., editing an image and emailing it). Another anticipated feature is Siri's contextual understanding of on-screen content and its ability to take actions based on that information.

Fortunately, not all of the new features will be delayed until next year. Siri's redesign and the integration of ChatGPT into iOS will be launched "later this year," as stated by Gurman. The redesign is expected to accompany the iOS 18 release while integrating ChatGPT might be postponed to a later date in 2024.