Apple has been developing a range of AI features for the upcoming iPhone 16 series and beyond, which were anticipated to be available to older models with the iOS 18 update. However, according to Mark Gurman, the more sophisticated AI features will only be accessible on the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max.
Limited AI Features for Older iPhones
Mark Gurman suggests that while the basic AI functions in iOS 18 will operate on-device, the more advanced features will necessitate more processing power and will depend on Apple’s servers.
Previous reports indicate that Apple is also creating chips for its servers to manage these advanced AI features. Additionally, there are mentions of the company’s plans to utilize its M series chips in servers to process AI tasks.
The restriction of cloud-based AI features to fewer iPhones could be due to the current limited infrastructure. Similar strategies have been adopted by Samsung and Google, who have also reserved many of their advanced AI capabilities for newer models.
iOS 18 AI Features
The iOS 18 update is expected to incorporate AI features such as notification summarization (termed Greymatter Catch Up), object removal from photos, an overhauled notes app with speech-to-text and summarization capabilities, among others. Siri will also gain new abilities, like opening specific documents, deleting emails, and summarizing articles.
AI Features for Older Models
Most text-based AI functionalities are likely to be considered basic features that can run on-device. Therefore, recent iPhone models eligible for iOS 18 (including the iPhone 11 series and above, iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR, iPhone SE 2nd and 3rd generations) might receive these features. However, it remains unclear which specific features will be available on-device.
Moreover, Gurman indicates that there could be some on-device AI features that only the iPhone 15 Pro models and later are capable of handling. These functionalities might not be available on older models and the non-Pro iPhone 15 models equipped with the A16 Bionic chip.
AI Features in iPadOS 18 and macOS 15
iPadOS 18 and macOS 15 are also set to receive some AI features. Gurman notes that the minimum requirement for macOS and iPadOS devices will be an M1 chip or later. Consequently, Intel-powered Mac devices will not support these features, which is understandable given that Intel chips and older iPhone Bionic chips lack the necessary NPU to run on-device LLMs.
