How to Use the New Siri AI on Your iPhone

You’re standing in the kitchen, hands covered in flour, and you ask your phone a simple follow-up: “What about doubling that recipe?” For years, the old Siri would have shrugged and offered to search the web. It forgot what you’d said five seconds earlier.

That’s the thing Apple is trying to fix with Siri AI, the rebuilt assistant that arrived with iOS 27. It remembers the conversation, understands what’s on your screen, and can dig through your own stuff. Support for more languages is also rolling out this month. Here’s what it does and how to try it yourself.

What Is Siri AI, Really?

Most people think of Siri as a voice remote control: set a timer, call Mom, play a song. Each request stands alone, and anything complicated gets bounced to a web search.

Siri AI works more like a chatbot built into your phone. You can talk or type, and it keeps track of the thread. It can also read what’s currently on your screen, and it can search your photos, messages, and notes using everyday language instead of exact keywords. It even has its own standalone app, so you can scroll back through past conversations like a chat history.

A few limits are worth knowing up front. It needs an iPhone 15 Pro or newer, it launched in English only (with French, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, and Spanish expected this month), and it isn’t available in the EU or China. Some people also land on a short waitlist the first time they turn it on.

How Does It Work?

Imagine a personal assistant who sits next to you all day. The old Siri was an assistant with no short-term memory: every time you spoke, they’d forgotten the last sentence. The new one keeps a notepad. It writes down what you said, glances at what’s on your screen, and can flip through your filing cabinet of photos and notes when you ask.

Under the hood, it uses a language model, the same kind of AI behind popular chatbots, to understand loosely worded requests. Instead of matching exact commands (“Set timer ten minutes”), it figures out what you mean (“Remind me when the pasta’s done”). Because it has on-screen awareness, it can use whatever you’re looking at as context, so “send this to Sam” actually knows what “this” is.

How to Try It Yourself

You don’t need anything but a supported iPhone and a few free minutes. Siri AI is part of the operating system, so there’s no extra subscription to buy.

Update your iPhone to iOS 27 in Settings > General > Software Update.

Open Settings > Siri and tap Turn On Siri, then choose Try the new Siri. If you’re put on a waitlist, check back later; waits have ranged from minutes to a few days.

Summon it by swiping down from the Dynamic Island, holding the side button, or opening the Siri app.

Start with a simple question, like “What’s a good dinner I can make in 20 minutes?”

Follow up without repeating yourself: “Make it vegetarian,” then “Add the ingredients to my shopping list.”

Open a photo or a web page, summon Siri, and ask about what you’re looking at: “What’s this plant?” or “Summarize this article.”

Try a search of your own stuff: “Find the photos from my trip to the lake last summer.”

Everything above is free, though your results depend on your phone model and language.

Tips to Get Better Results

Talk like you would to a person. You no longer need robotic commands. “Can you find that email about my flight?” works better than hunting for the perfect keyword.

Use follow-ups instead of starting over. The big upgrade is memory within a conversation. Refine your request step by step rather than cramming everything into one sentence.

Show it what you mean. If a question is about something on screen, open it first and then ask. Pointing at the context is faster than describing it.

Be specific about time and place. “Photos from last June at the beach” beats “beach photos,” because the more detail you give, the easier it is to narrow your own library.

Double-check anything important. Like every AI assistant, Siri can misunderstand or get things wrong. For dates, money, or messages to other people, read what it did before you rely on it.

Closing Thought

You’ve probably already given up on asking your phone anything harder than “what’s the weather.” That habit is worth breaking. Today, pick one small chore you’d normally do by tapping around, such as finding an old photo or drafting a quick reply, and ask Siri to do it instead. One real attempt will tell you more about where assistants are headed than any headline.