First Apple Intelligence features are incidental

Apple Intelligence is finally here (sort of). With iOS 18.1, the first tranche of AI features is finally coming to our phones (albeit in beta and temporarily behind a waiting list).

The iPhone 16 series was sold as: made For Apple Intelligence. This was Apple’s big push at summer’s WWDC, and nifty AI-powered features are front and center in all its phone marketing. Camera Control button? Even this is an artificial intelligence-supported feature waiting for its real purpose.

But First set of Apple Intelligence features Kind of… weak. I am using iOS 18.1 There are only two AI features that were really good throughout extended beta testing; the rest consists of various annoyances and “use it a few times and forget it” stunts.

Apple Intelligence: Good

There are two new AI features that I use every day that I think will become part of most people’s daily iPhone use: Notification summaries and the Cleanup tool.

New notification summaries ability can last almost any A notification that contains more than a few lines of text and shortens it to fit the notification. Text messages, social media posts, news alerts, email alerts… It seems like most notifications are basically useless. They informed you Something It did, but I got so used to not actually seeing the information I needed that I just tapped the notification and opened the app to see what it said.

Thanks to notification summaries, I get an idea of ​​what an alert is actually about, which lets me know which notifications really need my attention and which can wait. It’s great and completely intuitive. No learning curve; Your notifications instantly become much more useful.

The Cleanup tool in Photos, while not perfect, is a fun, quick, and easy way to play around with light photo editing and can quickly improve many impromptu shots. Unfortunately, Apple is kind of hiding this. To open a photo, To organise press the button (it looks like a set of levers and isn’t entirely intuitive) and then clean up button. This is the kind of useful feature that really deserves a top-tier interface button!

Apple

Apple Intelligence: Bad

The suggested replies in Messages and Mail are often terrible. I can’t remember the last time I chose to use one, and their glowing presence has become such a nuisance that I wish I could neutralize it easily.

The new Siri interface also sounds like a bad idea. I really like the new edge-lit glow and the way it passes over the screen (from the bottom if you say “Hey Siri”, from the right side if you use the side button). But this new look means selling a new Siri that doesn’t exist.

Siri is better at handling your “ums” and “ahs” and mid-sentence corrections gracefully, but it’s as dumb as ever when it comes to responding to requests. real The new Siri will introduce personal contextual awareness, screen awareness, and the renewed App Intent system to work within applications at the beginning of next year.

I get the impression that iPhone users will complain that “the new Siri still sucks” because they don’t realize that the new Siri isn’t here yet, it’s just been given a facelift.

Apple Intelligence: The rest

The writing tools aren’t particularly useful. I’ve almost never felt the need to pick a piece of text and change its tone or summarize it, and let’s face it, no one is going to edit their emails or social media posts with that. It’s kind of a cool tech demo, just “cool!” It’s the kind of thing you use a few times to say. and then I barely touch it again. When people think of AI and text, they think of asking a question or giving a brief clue and getting paragraphs of original text in response, and this is not that.

Luckily, it’s also hidden behind the text selection interface, so it’s easy enough to ignore completely. It won’t get in your way.

The new native Photo search feature works great and is really useful, but it’s hardly a game changer. The same goes for the new focus mode and summaries of call recordings and transcripts.

Apple Intelligence: Looking forward to good things

When the general public thinks of “AI” today, two things come to mind: long-form generative AI text and AI images, like ChatGPT writing your book report.

But Apple Intelligence doesn’t let you access any of this yet. Productive imaging features (except the Cleanup tool) had already appeared in the first release. iOS 18.2 The beta version is expected to arrive later this year, including seamless integration with ChatGPT. The Camera Control button will also be upgraded to invoke “Visual Intelligence” in iOS 18.2, making it more useful than the current app launcher and shutter release.

Apple

And of course there’s a long wait for the new Siri. Siri has become the poster child for artificial intelligence since Apple’s acquisition original Siri app and I integrated it into the iPhone 4s 13 years ago. After years of not investing enough money to improve Siri’s capabilities, Apple Intelligence finally seems ready to make a move. big We are increasing but we still have five or six months from getting this on our iPhone 16s.

In other words, our first taste of Apple Intelligence is a mixed bag at best, and it’ll be months before our new iPhone 16s do all the good things Apple’s marketing portrays.