Apple plans to allow other companies’ artificial intelligence (AI) assistants to be accessed from within its Siri voice assistant, so users can choose which service to query, Bloomberg reported Thursday (March 26), citing unnamed sources.
This feature, dubbed “Extensions,” will be part of the updated Siri that is set to be part of Apple’s upcoming iOS 27 operating system, according to the report.
Apple did not immediately reply to PYMNTS’ request for comment.
According to the Bloomberg report, Apple already allows Siri to tap into OpenAI’s ChatGPT, exclusively. The reported change would allow the voice assistant to tap into other services as well, making the iPhone a more powerful AI platform and allowing Apple to gain additional revenue from third-party app subscriptions via its App Store, the report said.
To enable these options, Apple will allow AI chatbot apps installed via its App Store to integrate with Siri, per the report.
This feature is planned, but it could change or be rescheduled, the report said.
Apple said in a Monday (March 23) press release that it will share its advancements in artificial intelligence at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), which the company will host online June 8-12.
“WWDC26 will spotlight incredible updates for Apple platforms, including AI advancements and exciting new software and development tools,” Apple said in the release.
Bloomberg reported Tuesday (March 24) that Apple plans to unveil the new Siri on the first day of WWDC, June 8, and that the updated voice assistant will be more like an AI agent and will interact in a conversational way through both text and voice.
Apple and Google announced in January that they had formed a partnership and that the next iteration of Apple’s Foundation Models will be based on Google’s Gemini and cloud tech. These models will help power new features for Siri and other tools that use Apple Intelligence, the company’s AI system.
According to Thursday’s report by Bloomberg, the new Extensions feature would not affect this partnership. The partnership with Google involves the underlying technology for Siri, while Extensions would allow users to query Google’s Gemini service along with other AI assistants, per the report.
Apple and OpenAI announced in June 2024 that they had partnered to integrate ChatGPT into iOS, macOS and iPadOS, enabling ChatGPT to tag in when Siri taps out. PYMNTS reported at the time that while Apple was starting with ChatGPT, “it promises to play nice with other AI models down the line.”
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