iPhone 16 AI features: Explained in release chronological order
The iPhone 16 represents Apple's attempt to catch up on AI integration, offering several key features that enhance user experience and productivity. One of the most notable advancements is the ability to interact with Siri more naturally.
Beyond Siri, AI is seamlessly integrated into various apps. The Messages and Mail apps now leverage AI to suggest appropriate responses, summarize lengthy threads, and compose emails in different tones. The Photos app benefits from AI-powered features like object removal and enhanced search capabilities.
For web browsing, the iPhone 16 introduces Intelligent Search, which analyzes web pages to highlight key points and provide summaries. The Web Eraser tool further streamlines the browsing experience by allowing users to remove unwanted elements from websites.
Important notice: All of the new AI features will not be immediately available with iOS 18, which is the software version each iPhone 16 series will come with in the beginning. The first batch of AI features will be introduced with the iOS 18.1 update, which Apple has stated will come sometime in October.
A list of all Apple Intelligence features:
- Messages, Mail, and Notes writing tools
- Mail app gets Smart Categorization, Digest View, Smart Reply, Email Summaries
- Safari improves: page summaries and removal of unwanted ads
- Voice transcription for the Phone and Notes apps
- Enhanced Photos app with smarter search and an object removal tool
- Siri becomes smarter and contextually aware
- Visual Intelligence (works like Google Lens)
- Image Playground lets you generate images
- Genmoji lets you create unique emojis
- ChatGPT integration
All iPhone 16 AI features in chronological order
iOS 18.1 AI features
Messages, Mail, and Notes writing tools
Apple Intelligence—like many other AI models—changes the way you write by being your personal editor. You can use it to have an email written in a different tone (friendly, professional, concise), or to proofread the text. It is also capable of summarizing, placing key points or a list, and even inserting a table.
You can even give specific instruction on what you want to change about the text and the AI will act according to your wants and needs as it works its magic.
Besides the numerous writing tools, users can also have long messages and emails summarized. You can even summarize whole email threads in order to catch up quickly on the most important parts.
Mail app improvements
The mail app on iPhones is getting a bit of an overhaul. Here are the new features it will receive:
- Smart Categorization: Emails are automatically sorted into Primary, Transactions, Updates, and Promotions.
- Digest View: Group emails by sender for easy reference.
- Unread Email Highlighting: New emails float to the top for visibility.
- Smart Reply: AI-powered response suggestions.
- Email Summaries: Quickly understand email content without opening.
Voice transcription
Users will gain the ability to record, transcribe, and summarize audio from the Phone and Notes apps.
Enhanced Photos app
Much like with Google's Magic Eraser tool, Apple has added a way for users to remove unwanted objects from photos. In fact, the tool appears to be even better, as it is aware of other parts of the image.
For example, if you want to remove a person that is partially behind someone else, the phone is aware of who/what you want to keep and does not let you accidentally cut them away as you mark the object you want removed.
Additionally, searching through photos and videos is now more intuitive as the app can understand more complex queries. Users can also create a memory by simply typing a description, with Apple Intelligence transforming their photos and videos into a movie.
Additionally, searching through photos and videos is now more intuitive as the app can understand more complex queries. Users can also create a memory by simply typing a description, with Apple Intelligence transforming their photos and videos into a movie.
Small Siri improvements
Siri will get a new look when it is activated, with a soft colorful glow appearing at the corners of your screen instead of the bubble from before.
Siri should also be more capable of handling conversations more naturally. Essentially, this means you can ask Siri questions without worrying if it understands you when you stumble over words as you talk. It should also means that you no longer have to be that careful about your wording and pronunciation.
You can even ask follow-up questions or give follow-up commands to Siri. This was somewhat possible before, but with the iOS 18.1 update Siri should understand and act upon more inputs. For example, you can ask Siri "What will the weather be like at Half Dome Yosemite tomorrow?" and then ask Siri to create a hike event there for that day.
Important notice: These features, which have been undergoing testing with developers, will initially be available in American English only and will be marked as 'beta' upon release. Apple plans to gather user feedback to refine and improve these features before a full, stable launch.
Coming until the end of 2024
Genmoji: Endless emoji possibilities
Apple is giving users the ability to create their own emojis with the new feature creatively dubbed "Genmoji." These generated emojis are created via prompts in the form of text, and they have the exact same style as that of regular Apple emojis.
Image Playground: Generative images
A new Image Playground app, which appears rather limited compared to the alternatives such as Microsoft's DALL-E, is available for users to create custom images with the help of Apple Intelligence and possibly ChatGPT. This feature likely functions like the popular Midjourney app.
Safari 18
Apple's Safari browser is getting some helpful updates to make browsing easier. A new feature called Intelligent Search uses artificial intelligence to analyze web pages and highlight key points or phrases. It can also provide a summary of the content, saving you time spent reading through long articles.
More exciting is the new Web Eraser tool that lets you remove unwanted elements from websites, like ads or distracting sections. Once removed, these elements stay hidden for future visits, creating a cleaner browsing experience.
ChatGPT integration
ChatGPT will come in play whenever Siri Siri can't answer a question you have. Instead of going to Google and giving you a bunch of search results, the iPhone will ask if you are okay with using ChatGPT for that particular instance. If you tap "Yes" ChatGPT will give you its own answer.
More variants of the English language
The new AI features that have come out up to this point are also expected to get support for other English dialects: such as U.K., New Zealand, Canada, Australia, and South Africa.
iOS AI features coming in the first half of 2025
More and bigger Siri improvements
- Contextual Awareness and Proactive Assistance
For instance, if you ask Siri, "When is mom's flight landing?" it will search contacts and messages to give you the flight details. You can even follow-up with a question about any plans you made with that person like "What's our dinner plan?" and Siri will draw out the exact message that has the information you need.
- Text-Based Interactions
Visual Intelligence
Apple announced one new AI-powered feature during the iPhone 16 event that was not mentioned at WWDC earlier this year, and that was Visual Intelligence. Essentially, it allows users to "instantly learn about everything they see" by using their iPhone's camera.
How does it work?
- Capacitive Camera Button: To activate Visual Intelligence, users will need to hold down the new capacitive camera button located on the side of the iPhone 16 and 16 Pro.
- Point and Shoot: Once the button is held down, users can point their phone's camera at any object or scene they're curious about.
- Instant Information: Using a combination of on-device intelligence and Apple's cloud-based services, the iPhone will analyze the image and provide relevant information.
Some example use cases include taking a picture of a restaurant to get its hours, location, and reviews; pointing your camera at a flyer or document to extract key information like title, date, and location; searching Google for a specific item you see, or getting help with a concept from your study notes; checking an pet's breed.
Visual Intelligence is available on all iPhone 16 models and can quickly be activated via the new Camera Control key that sides on the lower right side of the frame.
More language support
This is also when Apple is expected to add support for other languages, including Chinese, French, Spanish and Japanese.
Our thoughts so far
Apple Intelligence and the new AI features available with the iPhone 16 series are shaping up to have a major influence on the overall iOS experience. Some of the features mentioned above are already available on other phones, though... Not to mention the big delay and the fact that iPhone 16 buyers won't get the full Apple Intelligence suite until later next year.
So, needless to say, Apple Intelligence feels very underbaked and a bit of a mess at the moment. We think it will have a much more finalized look in the second half of next year, when all of the features will have come out and Apple would have had the time to fix any potential issues that arise.
For now, it seems Apple Intelligence was a move Apple had to make, instead of one it was ready to.
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