- Siri’s long-awaited AI upgrade is now scheduled for iOS 26.4.
- Apple initially promised the update for iOS 18, but delays pushed the release.
- The new Siri will offer natural conversation, contextual awareness, and deeper integration with apps.
- iOS 26.4 is likely to arrive around March 2026, based on Apple’s release history.
Apple’s vision of a smarter, AI-powered Siri is still a work in progress. Although the company first announced its redesigned digital assistant back at WWDC 2024, the experience never entered iOS 18 as advertised. Mark Gurman of Bloomberg reports that the next major update to Siri will arrive with iOS 26.4, likely in March 2026.
Siri’s Upgrade: Years in the Making
Long overdue, Siri is finally getting an upgrade in its functionality beyond the simple and often exasperating functions currently usable by Apple customers. At WWDC 2024, Apple showed a much smarter Siri that is powered by Apple Intelligence, and has such features as:
- Better understanding of natural, imperfect speech
- Ability to follow multi-step conversations
- Seamless switching between voice and text input
- Deeper integration with both Apple and third-party apps
However, along with the hype, iOS 18 was released in fall 2024 with merely a visual update, a glowing border animation around the iPhone screen when Siri is invoked.
Why the Delay?
In March 2025, Apple confessed to John Gruber of Daring Fireball that the new Siri features were taking “longer than we thought”. However, the corporation was optimistic about a 2025 launch. That has now changed as well.
Executives Craig Federighi and Greg Joswiak told Toms Guide at WWDC 2025 that the new Siri experience is now likely to arrive in the following year.
That corresponds with the most recent report by Gurman, who says the actual AI breakthrough in Siri will come with iOS 26.4, presumably in March of 2026, based on previous release schedules:
- iOS 17.4 launched: March 5, 2024
- iOS 18.4 launched: March 31, 2025
- Expected iOS 26.4 release: March 2026
What Will Siri 2.0 Do?
In a press release, the upgraded Siri will be developed on Apple Intelligence, Apple’s privacy-centric AI system. The assistant will support hundreds of new actions, including:
- “Bring up that article about cicadas from my Reading List.”
- “Send the photos from the barbecue on Saturday to Malia.”
- Understanding context from prior requests
- Personalizing responses based on user habits and preferences
This should bring Siri much closer to the power of contemporary AI chatbots, such as ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and Alexa, utilising generative AI, and ultimately making it feel like a 2026 assistant, rather than a time capsule from 2011.
What We Have So Far
Even though it took iOS 18 to implement it, smart functionality is not the only update that Siri received cosmetically. Rather than the standard Siri bubble, summoning the assistant will now result in a light encircling the screen borders, which appears much more contemporary and involved. Sadly, that is as much as the updates have carried out yet.
