For the last 15 years, talking to Siri, Apple’s virtual assistant on iPhones, felt profoundly uncool. Though it performed a few basic tasks, like adding calendar appointments and setting timers, Siri was so subpar that asking it for help was often counterproductive.
So when Apple announced in June that a “profoundly more capable” Siri powered by Google’s artificial intelligence (AI) would arrive this year, I wondered: Will we finally see people talking to Siri on the train, on the streets, in the office?
That’s an important question because mainstream adoption of the new version of the Apple assistant, Siri AI, could be a litmus test for AI’s effect on consumer technology in the coming years.
The people most bullish about AI, including tech executives like Sam Altman of OpenAI and Satya Nadella of Microsoft, believe it will become more important than operating systems and apps. They envision a future in which people talk to AI assistants to control their devices. In theory, the company with the most popular “agent” (techie speak for assistant) could win the AI race that drives the future of computing.
A more moderate view – the approach Apple is taking with Siri AI – is that chatbots could simply be another tool in an operating system, like many other features and apps, that people can use or ignore.
To get to know the new Siri, I installed an early version of Apple’s next operating system, iOS 27, which includes Siri AI, on my iPhone and prodded the Apple assistant with requests for about six weeks.
My early impressions were that Siri AI is a big improvement from the old-school Apple assistant (frankly, that’s a low bar), but it hasn’t fundamentally changed the way I use the iPhone. I still mostly scroll through apps and only occasionally feel the need to ask Siri for help. Siri AI does, however, have some neat tricks that lots of people will enjoy for speeding up tedious tasks, like editing photos, creating grocery lists and updating address books.
Here’s what you need to know about what has changed and a set of prompts to try when Siri AI becomes widely available this year.
Meet the new Siri AI
You can chat with Siri AI in various ways, some new and some old:
– You can open a new Siri app and type or dictate prompts, similar to other chatbots like ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude.
– You can summon the assistant by holding down the button on the right side of the phone or by saying, “Hey, Siri,” followed by a question or request, just as in the past.
– You can swipe down from the middle of the top of the screen to open a box that lets you type a search query or a question for Siri.
Prompt 1: A Personal Request
Siri AI can take action with your personal information. For example, it can scan your text messages to find out when a relative’s aeroplane lands or look up the time of a doctor appointment inside your email. This example involves asking Siri to work with two apps – find a grocery item inside a text message from a spouse and then add that item to a shopping list in the Reminders app:
What did Sally ask me to get at the grocery store? Can you add it to my shopping list?
Prompt 2: Help With This
When you use the word “this,” Siri will often react to whatever is currently on your screen, such as a website you’re browsing or a photo you are looking at. For example, when I was browsing the AMC website to buy tickets for The Odyssey, I asked Siri to add the screening to my calendar with four simple words:
Add this to calendar.
Prompt 3: Edit Photos
Editing photos on a tiny phone screen can be very tedious, so asking Siri is a quick shortcut. The prompt below will probably be a go-to for many who want to remove random strangers from their otherwise perfect vacation photos:
Remove the photo bomber from this photo.
Prompt 4: Find a Photo
Our photo albums get bloated with thousands of images, so it can be hard to find a specific photo to show to a friend. Just give Siri a description of the photo you’re looking for, and it will surface a few candidates. For example:
Find that photo of my daughter eating ice cream.
Prompt 5: Find a Restaurant
Siri AI can also pull information from the web to answer your questions. Try asking for help with finding a place to eat and then layer on follow-up questions to narrow down the results:
Are there any good pizza places within walking distance? Which one is open latest tonight?
What to expect
Apple customers, including owners of iPhones, iPads, Macs and the Apple Watch, can test the new Siri on their devices by installing public betas – early, unfinished versions of the operating systems – and then joining a waiting list for Siri AI access. However, because these are early days, Siri AI is occasionally glitchy. (For one, the assistant failed to translate a Chinese restaurant menu into English.) To avoid bugs, I recommend waiting for the operating systems to fully release this fall before trying out the assistant.
During my testing, however, I noticed a clear sign that Siri was on a brighter path. What drove me batty with the past version of Siri was that whenever I asked it to add “Go to gym” to my calendar, the assistant would consistently add “Go to Jim” as a calendar appointment, no matter how many times I corrected it.
When I made that request with Siri AI this week, the assistant responded: “Sorry, did you say go to gym or go to Jim?”
“The former,” I replied. The assistant made the appropriate entry to my calendar. Not perfect, but better. – ©2026 The New York Times Company
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
