Apple is secretly working on its generative AI and chatbot game, according to a new report from Bloomberg, with the tech giant apparently preparing to make a “significant AI-related announcement” next year. But what exactly does that mean for your Apple technology, especially your iPhone?
Right now, not much. As we’ve explained elsewhere, these rumors are really just confirmation that Apple remains competitive and on top of this year’s biggest tech hype story. But rumors of a planned AI announcement also raise the exciting possibility that Apple will embrace generative AI and chatbots in a broader way than its attempts to dabble in thus far.
Don’t expect to see an Apple-made version of ChatGPT in your iPhone firmware updates anytime soon. The hurdles to achieving this are considerable, including the fact that the large language models used by such chatbots are too large to run locally on devices, which doesn’t tally with Apple’s strong focus on privacy.
That means Apple’s internal chatbot, dubbed Apple GPT, is only for Apple employees to play with, and according to Bloomberg, the tech giant “has no plans to release it to consumers.” But the new framework Apple is building for creating large language models, ostensibly called Ajax, is a different matter.
This big AI push has apparently become “a big effort for Apple” and has apparently already yielded machine learning fruits like the ones we heard about at WWDC 2023, including a much improved version of AutoCorrect.
So how else could Apple’s supposed generative AI technology improve our lives in the near future, particularly when combined with the increasingly powerful Neural Engine that has appeared in successive generations of Apple’s silicon? Here’s our wishlist of AI-powered enhancements for future iPhones, based on Apple’s recent announcements and rumors of planned features.
1. A very useful Siri
It’s fair to say that Apple’s Siri voice assistant is a bit of rubbish. Despite launching way back in 2011, it seems like it’s barely progressed since then, although to be fair, neither Alexa nor Google Assistant are much better. Given that large speech models are a lifesaver for conversational interaction, a next-gen Siri seems like the most likely candidate for Apple’s AI announcement in 2024.
The potential roadblock for Apple is that today’s Siri is, as the tech giant itself says, “designed to do as much learning as possible offline, right on your device.” And that’s a potential bottleneck for big AI-powered improvements, even with big improvements to Apple’s Neural Engine.
However, some lightweight AI chatbots can already run locally on your iPhone or old PC, so it’s possible that a more conversational Siri, rather than the somewhat silly and detached experience we have today, could be the star of Apple’s AI push, without compromising its privacy policy. After all, in 2018 Apple hired John Giannandrea, former head of search and artificial intelligence at Google, to help it do just that, and recent job postings they focused heavily on “conversational and generative AI”.
2. A smart health app
In addition to next-generation Siri, Apple is apparently working on a next-generation version of its iOS Health app that will be powered by machine learning, with recent rumors suggesting it could arrive as early as September.
It’s too soon for Apple to integrate the kind of generative AI and chatbot technology mentioned in Bloomberg’s report. And new Health app leaks suggest its “smarts” will be relatively straightforward, offering tailored lifestyle advice based on heart rate, sleep, diet and breathing data.
So how could Ajax, which is apparently now unifying and accelerating Apple’s machine learning development, further boost Apple’s health offerings? If Apple further develops conversational chatbots alongside Siri, this could allow you to interrogate your health data with questions, rather than simply relying on impersonal summaries.
Given the Health app’s increased focus on mental health in iOS 17, new AI-powered features are likely appearing here as well, with recent rumors suggesting the app may even track your moods by capturing speech and analyzing text messages. However, whatever happens, Apple will almost certainly ensure that your health data continues to be fully encrypted on the device and in iCloud.
3. A new fitness coaching service
In addition to AI-powered improvements to its Health app, Apple is also rumored to be working on a new coaching service, ostensibly codenamed Quartz. And given that this is roughly scheduled to be announced next year, it’s another potential candidate for that supposedly big AI announcement in 2024.
Little is known about Quartz so far, other than that it will be designed to improve exercise motivation, eating habits, and sleep. According to Bloomberg, the main goal is “to use artificial intelligence and data from an Apple Watch to make suggestions and create coaching programs tailored to specific users.”
That means it could be a big target for Apple’s new Ajax framework for building large language models that are particularly adept at both conversation and summarizing large amounts of data.
But, unlike Apple’s Health app, it looks like you may have to pay for the privilege of using Quartz’s AI abilities, similar to Apple Fitness Plus, if and when it launches next year.
4. An even smarter camera
Apple already uses artificial intelligence (which it prefers to call machine learning) in processing iPhone photos. One of the most notable examples was the arrival of “Deep Fusion” on the iPhone 11 Pro, which combines all the best bits of a burst of photos taken before even pressing the shutter.
So how could Apple’s new push into generative AI make your snaps or videos even better? The improvements are likely to focus on automated photo editing, an area Apple has been quietly moving into in recent years. For example, in iOS 16 Apple added the ability to crop a subject such as a person or pet by simply tapping and holding the photo.
While Apple has traditionally left powerful editing tools to third-party apps, Ajax-based developments in generative AI could take these ideas further into the Camera app. Apple could drastically improve the “magic wand” auto-editing tool to remove distracting objects from photos or refine the edit based on your favorite photographers.
A local chatbot-like interface could also make finding your photos in your camera roll much easier, with Google’s new Bard image recognition providing a good example of how powerful AI can be when analyzing photos.
5. More powerful search
One of the strengths of large language models is the rapid summarization of huge amounts of information and data, and this could help greatly improve your iPhone’s search function.
Currently, swiping down on an iPhone’s home screen and typing into the search field is a rather hit-and-miss affair, and it certainly can’t handle very specific conversational queries that delve into the little details within Apple’s many stock apps, like Mail, Photos, and Reminders.
It might not sound as captivating as a big AI update to Apple Maps or mobile Safari, but the ability to quickly find anything on your iPhone would be a big quality-of-life improvement — and it’s something offshoots of Apple’s purported Ajax framework could help deliver.
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