Apple says its revamped version of Siri will still launch in 2026, despite rumors that the company is having issues with the new more personalized Siri, leading to possible delays.
Apple told CNBC on Thursday that it is still on track to launch in 2026.
Apple promised a more personalized Siri that would use Apple intelligence since the unveiling of iOS 18 back in June 2024. At the time, it was believed that all of the new features would make it into iOS 18 by spring 2025. However, once spring arrived, Apple admitted that the new version of Siri was taking more time, and we wouldn’t see full functionality until a year later.
Since then, the stated target for the release of new and improved Siri has been iOS 26.4. However, as we reported on Thursday it looks like we may have to wait a bit longer for all of that new personalized Siri goodness.
While Apple never announced an official timeline for the release of the new Siri, most reports have indicated Apple is aiming for a release alongside iOS 26.4. If there are indeed delays, the new version of Siri could be delayed until iOS 26.5 or ::SHUDDER!:: iOS 27. (Apple will preview iOS 27 at this June’s Worldwide Developers Conference. Technically, since Apple only said “2026,” that means as long as the release is by the end of December, they will have fulfilled the promise.
Apple has reportedly run into unforeseen problems in testing Siri, which often improperly processing queries and takes too long to respond to requests.
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman says his sources tell him that Apple has told engineers to perform additional testing with iOS 26.5, indicating a delay until at least when that software version is released to the public.
Internally, iOS 26.5 includes notices describing the Siri features, as well as a “preview” toggle for turning on the Siri personalization feature.
While employees involved in testing says iOS 26.5 has all of the features Apple had promised, not all of the features are working properly.
Siri is also said to occasionally use ChatGPT for information in place of the Gemini-powered technology the company recently made a deal with Google to use, even when the new version of Siri is capable of handling a user’s request.
Apple is likely to seed the first beta of iOS 26.4 to developers later this month, so hopefully we’ll learn more about the state of Siri then.