the new Siri at the forefront of a bigger update than it seems

iOS 27 has a clear protagonist: Siri. After years of falling behind what many expected from an assistant built into the iPhone, Apple has shown in the WWDC26 a much more ambitious version, designed to better understand what we do, help us within the apps and respond with more context. Artificial intelligence takes a good part of the focus, but this update also touches many pieces of everyday life: from the camera and photos to Liquid Glass and performance.

Siri: Apple’s great pending promise

Assistant is by far the most ambitious change to the iPhone operating system. Those from Cupertino have not limited themselves to giving longer answers or a more natural voice: they have updated Siri with Apple Intelligence at the center so that it better understands personal context, takes into account what appears on the screen, recognizes images and can act within applications. It also gains access to updated knowledge of the web and becomes more conversational, with richer responses and the possibility of maintaining a back-and-forth with the user.

The idea is that Siri stops serving only to set an alarm or send a message and starts solving more complex tasks simply by asking it. Apple has shown simple but very illustrative examples: “when is the Suki Waterhouse concert in San Francisco?”, “how can I buy tickets?”, or more personal requests supported by information distributed by the device. It will also be able to help with writing and editing practically anywhere we can enter text. Everything seems to indicate that Siri wants to stop being a function that we use to get by and become a layer of help that is much more present on the iPhone.

Liquid Glass: Apple adjusts its big redesign after listening to feedback

Liquid Glass It also receives adjustments in iOS 27. Apple introduced this visual language last year as its most ambitious cross-platform design update, but now it recognizes something quite natural in a change of this size: after the first leap come the refinements. The company has explained that it has listened to comments from users and developers. This translates to a new slider in Settings to adapt its look, from a lighter, sharper version to a more tinted one. Added to this is a more uniform top toolbar in applications, designed to keep labels, text and headers more readable.

Search: Spotlight, Photos and Mail better find what’s already there

Apple has also rebuilt one of those parts of the system that we only miss when it fails: search. We’ve all had that moment of looking for something we know is on the iPhone and for some reason it doesn’t appear. With iOS 27, the company has redesigned the base that powers Spotlight, Photos and Mail, with a more stable, efficient and complete index to better understand what content we have and where to find it. After updating, the system will re-index the device to have a more accurate image of what was already there. In Mail there is also a new ranking system so that the email we are looking for has more options to appear at the top.

Child safety: more controls for families and adolescents

The apple firm has also dedicated a part of iOS 27 to child safety. Apple expands the tools so that parents can better decide who their children communicate with, manage access to apps and adapt device use to different times of the day. Communication Safety will continue to warn and blur images or videos that may contain nudity, and also adds new protections against shared violent content. In Time of Use, there are recommendations for daily limits by categories such as entertainment, games and social networks, as well as times to choose which apps are available during school, on the weekend or during leisure time.

In development.

Images | Apple

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