Rumors of a partnership between Apple and OpenAI have been circulating for some time now, but it looks like the two companies have finally signed a deal to bring ChatGPT functionality to iOS 18 and other Apple operating systems.
According to a recent report from The Information (via AppleInsider), OpenAI has agreed to help the iPhone maker bring AI features to its various platforms, and while details of the deal are still under wraps, we're willing to bet that the assistant Apple's Siri voice tool could soon be overhauled with the large language model (LLM) powered by OpenAI's ChatGPT.
What does that mean exactly? It's hard to say for sure right now (Apple will likely tell us more at WWDC 2024 in June), but it seems safe to expect a new and improved Siri to use the power of ChatGPT to answer voice queries in a more responsive way, precise and nuanced than it is currently capable of offering.
This isn't to say that Siri is about to become ChatGPT in all but name. Apple has always seen (and we suspect still sees) Siri as an assistant rather than a chatbot, and the company will surely continue to prioritize privacy over do-it-all functionality.
But the on-device processing behind Siri in its current form simply isn't up to par in 2024. So this reported deal could presumably see Apple leverage OpenAI's ChatGPT LLM to boost Siri's question-answering capabilities. a way that does not compromise user privacy.
Think about it like this: right now, Siri is a pretty useless intermediary between the user and Google. You ask Siri a question and it presents you with a list of popular Google search results that may or may not give you the answer you're looking for. Most importantly, though, Siri doesn't tell Google that you were the one who asked the question.
A ChatGPT-powered Siri could work in much the same way, but instead of returning a list of Google search results for you to manually sift through, you could anonymously ask ChatGPT for a simple, concise answer to your query, which it then will transmit to you. To you.
But wait! “How is this solution different from the voice-enabled ChatGPT app, which is already available on iPhone?” I hear you ask. Well, as good as ChatGPT's built-in voice feature is, it's not built into your iPhone in the same way as Siri. This deal between OpenAI and Apple could rectify that problem, combining the benefits of assistant and chatbot in a way that maintains Apple's signature style and simplicity.
The deal would apparently also benefit OpenAI. A recent study revealed that only a small proportion of people with access to ChatGPT use it daily, and while that lack of uptake is likely due to issues of accuracy rather than accessibility, there's no denying that incorporating generative AI tools into consumer products I would encourage more users to adopt them in their daily lives.
As mentioned, we'll likely hear Apple shed more light on its OpenAI partnership at WWDC 2024, which kicks off on June 10. For information on how to tune in to the long-awaited developer conference, check out our how-to. to see the WWDC 2024 guide.
