Rumors have been swirling for months that Apple is planning to introduce a ChatGPT rival into all of its best iPhones, and those whispers have just been boosted by a brand-new report that lends weight to the idea.
According to industry analyst Jeff Pu (via MacRumors), we could see the so-called “Apple GPT” chatbot launch as soon as late 2024. That means it might make it into iOS 18 and the iPhone 16, potentially bringing generative artificial intelligence (AI) to Apple’s devices sooner than expected.
However, before we all get too excited, Pu warned that we’ll need to be patient with the rollout of Apple’s AI. That’s because Apple wants to make sure it avoids some of the privacy lapses that have befallen AI apps recently, and doing that might take time.
Pu added that his sources have told him that Apple plans to build several hundred AI servers this year, with considerably more following in 2024.
The finished product could combine cloud AI with on-device processing in a way that safeguards user privacy, Pu believes.
A massive boost for Siri
The report doesn’t give too much detail on what Apple plans to do with its generative AI, but other analysts have put forth a few ideas. Most prominently, news outlet The Information has suggested that AI could be woven into Siri to make Apple’s virtual assistant far more useful than it currently is.
Apple CEO Tim Cook has even publicly acknowledged that the company has been working on generative AI “for years.” He added that “we’re going to approach it really thoughtfully and think about it deeply, because we’re fully aware of the not-good uses that it can have, and the issues around bias and hallucination and so forth.”
That suggests Pu’s 2024 release date might be a little optimistic. As well as that, fellow analyst Ming-Chi Kuo has previously claimed that Apple’s AI progress was “significantly behind its competitors,” suggesting that the company has a long way to go before it’s ready to launch its AI.
Regardless of when Apple GPT makes an appearance, it’s clear that Apple is pouring a lot of effort into challenging ChatGPT and releasing something better. If it’s due out in iOS 18, we might even see a sneak peek at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in June 2024.
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