Apple Intelligence's AI Notification Summaries: Unintentionally Hilarious and Occasionally Concerning

Is it weird that I love Apple's hilariously cryptic AI notifications?

Apple Intelligence bought the promise of an integrated personal AI system to streamline our busy lives, but one feature is bringing that practicality into question - AI notification summaries. While in theory, concise and condensed notifications are a handy feature, some users' cryptic and unintentionally hilarious results are raising more questions than answers. Last month Apple Intelligence launched to general users in iOS 18.1, and since then reviews have been mixed, to say the least. While its new writing tools and photo clean-up capabilities are handy (albeit nothing new - Google's Magic Editor got there first), Apple's bizarre AI notification summaries are the accidental star of Apple Intelligence for all the wrong reasons. While Apple Intelligence's summaries are essentially a TLDR of all your notifications, they lack the context of human sarcasm, jokes and slang, making for some hilariously blunt and bizarre summaries. While the feature seems to work better with long-form emails, casual texts and humourous tweets are transformed into cryptic riddles rather than helpful synopsises. While admittedly it might not be the time-saving feature that Apple intended, they certainly add a refreshing hilarity to bog-standard notifications. Some users are even seeing them as a challenge, trying to decipher the mysterious summaries out of context. "Big fan of Apple Intelligence's summary feature - mainly because it turns every boring notification I wouldn't previously read into a cute little mystery to unwrap," Threads user danielocnnr wrote. For more insight into Apple's latest AI features, check out why Apple Intelligence could be bad news for AI gadgets like the Rabbit R1 and AI Pin. If you're after more AI news, take a look at how spatial intelligence is set to revolutionise AI's understanding of the world.

The unintentional hilarity of Apple Intelligence's summary notifications

Serving tech enthusiasts for over 25 years. TechSpot means tech analysis and advice you can trust. WTF?! AI is still a long way from the human-like, thinking machines from sci-fi. Apple's recently released Apple Intelligence, for example, is prone to acting very unintelligent, especially when it comes to its notification summaries. But at least they're often unintentionally hilarious. Apple finally introduced its suite of AI features with the release of iOS/iPadOS 18.1 and macOS 15.1 last month. It offers the usual capabilities, such as assisted writing tools, image generation, photo enhancements, and more. Another Apple Intelligence feature is its ability to summarize notifications. Cupertino says the summaries allow users to scan long or stacked notifications with key details right on the Lock Screen, such as when a group chat is particularly active. As with so many things, AI often struggles with these summaries as it usually fails to understand context and human expressions. It's a particularly harsh experience for anyone being dumped, as the summary below illustrates. This isn't the first time that Apple Intelligence has delivered news of a breakup in a less than sensitive way. Last month, a New York-based developer received the summary notification: "No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment." Summaries about dating in general also seem a little off, though one could imagine those below being read in a robotic voice by a Data-like android prototype. Apple Intelligence also seems unable to understand when someone is using the term "killed" when not referring to literally killing someone. CNET notes how a summary from someone stating that their personal trainer "killed" them appeared in a quite startling fashion: "Trainer allegedly killed, need to go to the hospital." There was also this gem from someone who said the hike they were on almost killed them. Two unrelated bits of information or a notification that the zombie apocalypse has begun? Another apparent warning that we will all soon be dead, much to the disappointment of South Baltimore's Amtrak customers. Tim Cook said Apple Intelligence notification summaries "changed" his life. The Apple boss will always exaggerate the effectiveness of one of his company's products, but unless he was talking about them making him laugh more, that's quite the stretch, even for a CEO.

Apple Intelligence's New Notification Summary Feature Can Be Absurdly Wrong

Nelson Aguilar is an LA-based tech how-to writer and graduate of UCLA. With more than a decade of experience, he covers Apple and Google and writes on iPhone and Android features, privacy and security settings and more. Apple released Apple Intelligence to the general public with iOS 18.1 last month. This latest mobile software update brings several new AI features to compatible Phone models, like writing tools to help you proofread your emails and the Clean Up tool to remove objects from your photos in seconds. You might be disappointed to learn that there is no AI in Siri -- that's coming later (iOS 18.2). And Visual Intelligence isn't here yet either. And to continue with the complaints, there's one particular AI feature on the iPhone that constantly stresses me out or just plain confuses me. And that's notification summaries for text messages. Read more: How to Get Apple Intelligence on Your iPhone With iOS 18.1 The new notification summary feature on Apple Intelligence uses AI to "intelligently" summarize your notifications, so you can quickly scan through key details from your busiest apps. And while the feature works pretty well for summarizing long emails into succinct points, it doesn't always make sense with text messages. Apple Intelligence takes things too literally sometimes. The other day, I received several text messages about how bad a hike was and how that person felt "dead" (tired) after, along with some other sparse details. This is how Apple Intelligence summarized those few messages for me: This is a text about how a trainer "killed" my friend with a particular tough workout. Apple Intelligence, and more specifically the notification summaries feature, just doesn't do well with sarcasm, exaggerations, jokes and slang. And that's a problem, especially with how informal text messaging can be. There's even a subreddit with a ton of terrible notification summaries that people have received from Apple Intelligence. It takes everything at face value, which can lead to some pretty horrifying, incorrect or simply annoying summaries for text messages. Instead of stressing each time a disturbing summary appears, I disabled notification summaries for text messages. If you want to do the same, it's easy: In place of receiving condensed summaries of multiple text messages, you'll see every individual text message on your lock screen or notification center like usual. You could completely disable notification summaries (turn off Summarize Previews) for every single app on your phone, but as I mentioned earlier, it works pretty well for emails and third-party apps.

Apple AI notification summaries exist; rarely useful, often hilarious

iPhones, iPads, and Macs with Apple Intelligence now have a unique AI feature that summarizes notifications for you. Starting with iOS / iPadOS 18.1 and macOS 15.1, when multiple notifications pile up for a given app, the tiny LLM that Apple has crammed into our stuff tries its hardest to algorithm up a brief overview for you. (Part of a group text with lots of people? It'll try to tell you what they're discussing.) This is sometimes good. It is very often funny.

I've Been Using Apple Intelligence for Weeks, and One Feature Stands Out

Expertise Apple | Samsung | Google | Smartphones | Smartwatches | Wearables | Fitness trackers Apple Intelligence finally arrived last month as part of the iPhone's iOS 18.1 update, introducing a wave of new features such as the ability to rewrite text, create photo montages based on a prompt, remove objects from photos and type to Siri. Apple's virtual helper is also better at understanding you even when you stumble over your words. But there's one addition in particular that's stuck with me: Message summaries. iPhones capable of running Apple Intelligence can provide summaries of incoming texts, with the goal being to help you catch up on messages at a glance. The technology is far from perfect; it can't process sarcasm in a way that makes sense, nor can it understand context in most situations. But it's a perfect example of the type of passive artificial intelligence I hope to see more of on phones in 2025 and beyond. And more importantly, it helps keep me sane when I'm bombarded with messages from all sources throughout the day, whether they be iMessages from family members or Slack updates from teammates. As I've written in the past, most new AI features from Apple and other phone makers feel like a solution to niche problems that may not need solving (how much time do you really spend thinking about how to phrase a text message?) Most of the time, I go about my day forgetting these tools exist. But message summaries, even in their current form, add an extra layer of convenience to my phone without requiring any effort on my part, which is exactly where the promise in AI lies for phones. Read more: I Tried the iPhone 16's New Visual Intelligence and It Feels Like the Future To get message summaries, you need to have a compatible iPhone running iOS 18.1. Apple Intelligence is available only on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max and the iPhone 16 lineup, so if you have an older model you're out of luck. The good news is that if you have any of those devices and are running Apple's latest software, message summaries should be on by default. But if you're not seeing them, or would prefer to turn them off, you can do so easily in your iPhone's settings menu. Just open the Settings app, scroll down to the Apps option and then select Messages from your list of apps. Press the Summarize Messages toggle to turn this feature on or off. Apple Intelligence summarizes notifications from third-party apps like Slack or WhatsApp too. If you want to turn these summaries on or off, go to Settings, tap Notifications and select Summarize Previews. From here, you can hand-pick which apps you'd like to receive notification summaries for by toggling the switch next to each app. You can also turn off Apple Intelligence entirely by choosing Apple Intelligence & Siri from the Settings menu and tapping the switch. Message summaries elevate the iPhone's software in a way that makes it feel smarter. Rather than having to go out of your way to find a specific feature, such as the Clean Up tool for getting rid of unwanted background objects in pictures, it just works without a second thought. It also addresses a need that impacts a fundamental use case for our phones: communication. I've witnessed this firsthand on many occasions over the past couple of months while using the developer beta of iOS 18.1 ahead of its official release. Of all the types of notifications I get each day, messages are the most frequent, which can range from work-related updates in Slack, to silly daily banter with friends in WhatsApp or session planning with my Dungeons & Dragons party members in Discord. Things can get chaotic when I'm unable to check my phone for long stretches of the workday, typically resulting in a slew of alerts and messages to catch up on. Thankfully, the iPhone's message summaries have helped with this -- sort of. At a glance, I can at least see what my messages are about before I dive in. I can tell whether my work colleagues are asking for my help with something or just chatting about a new story idea. Or whether the dozen text messages that just came in from my friends are due to an emergency or just friendly chatter. Apple Intelligence has a long way to go in terms of accuracy, so I wouldn't recommend relying on these summaries in place of checking your messages. There are plenty of times in which it misinterprets the meaning behind a message because it lacks the level of understanding that only humans -- especially people who know each other well and communicate frequently -- can have. Most of the time, these mishaps result in nothing more than a good laugh. But my colleague Nelson Aguilar received misinterpretations that are far more concerning. When a friend texted him about a difficult hike, noting that they were "dead" tired, the Apple Intelligence summary said the hike was fatal. It's yet another reminder that AI, whether it be Apple's text recaps, answers from ChatGPT or search summaries from Google, are no replacement for the real thing. But for now, I'm grateful to at least be able to tell whether friends or family are texting me due to an emergency or just for laughs by glancing at my lock screen.

This iOS 18.1 Feature Keeps Me Sane When My Group Text Messages Get Chaotic

Expertise Apple | Samsung | Google | Smartphones | Smartwatches | Wearables | Fitness trackers Apple Intelligence launched in its first phase with the arrival of iOS 18.1, bringing with it a wave of new features, such as the ability to rewrite text, create photo montages based on a prompt, remove objects from photos and type to Siri. But there's one addition in particular that's stuck with me: Message summaries. iPhones capable of running Apple Intelligence can provide summaries of incoming texts, with the goal being to help you catch up on messages at a glance. The technology is far from perfect; it can't process sarcasm in a way that makes sense, nor can it understand context in most situations. But it's a perfect example of the type of passive artificial intelligence I hope to see more of on phones in 2025 and beyond. And more importantly, it helps keep me sane when I'm bombarded with messages from all sources throughout the day, whether they be iMessages from family members or Slack updates from teammates. As I've written in the past, most new AI features from Apple and other phone makers feel like a solution to niche problems that may not need solving (how much time do you really spend thinking about how to phrase a text message?) Most of the time, I go about my day forgetting these tools exist. But message summaries, even in their current form, add an extra layer of convenience to my phone without requiring any effort on my part, which is exactly where the promise in AI lies for phones. Read more: I Tried the iPhone 16's New Visual Intelligence and It Feels Like the Future To get message summaries, you need to have a compatible iPhone running iOS 18.1. Apple Intelligence is available only on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max and the iPhone 16 lineup, so if you have an older model you're out of luck. The good news is that if you have any of those devices and are running Apple's latest software, message summaries should be on by default. But if you're not seeing them, or would prefer to turn them off, you can do so easily in your iPhone's settings menu. Just open the Settings app, scroll down to the Apps option and then select Messages from your list of apps. Press the Summarize Messages toggle to turn this feature on or off. Apple Intelligence summarizes notifications from third-party apps like Slack or WhatsApp too. If you want to turn these summaries on or off, go to Settings, tap Notifications and select Summarize Previews. From here, you can hand-pick which apps you'd like to receive notification summaries for by toggling the switch next to each app. You can also turn off Apple Intelligence entirely by choosing Apple Intelligence & Siri from the Settings menu and tapping the switch. Message summaries elevate the iPhone's software in a way that makes it feel smarter. Rather than having to go out of your way to find a specific feature, such as the Clean Up tool for getting rid of unwanted background objects in pictures, it just works without a second thought. It also addresses a need that impacts a fundamental use case for our phones: communication. I've witnessed this firsthand on many occasions over the past couple of months while using the developer beta of iOS 18.1 ahead of its official release. Of all the types of notifications I get each day, messages are the most frequent, which can range from work-related updates in Slack, to silly daily banter with friends in WhatsApp or session planning with my Dungeons & Dragons party members in Discord. Things can get chaotic when I'm unable to check my phone for long stretches of the workday, typically resulting in a slew of alerts and messages to catch up on. Thankfully, the iPhone's message summaries have helped with this -- sort of. At a glance, I can at least see what my messages are about before I dive in. I can tell whether my work colleagues are asking for my help with something or just chatting about a new story idea. Or whether the dozen text messages that just came in from my friends are due to an emergency or just friendly chatter. Apple Intelligence has a long way to go in terms of accuracy, so I wouldn't recommend relying on these summaries in place of checking your messages. There are plenty of times in which it misinterprets the meaning behind a message because it lacks the level of understanding that only humans -- especially people who know each other well and communicate frequently -- can have. Most of the time, these mishaps result in nothing more than a good laugh. But my colleague Nelson Aguilar received misinterpretations that are far more concerning. When a friend texted him about a difficult hike, noting that they were "dead" tired, the Apple Intelligence summary said the hike was fatal. It's yet another reminder that AI, whether it be Apple's text recaps, answers from ChatGPT or search summaries from Google, are no replacement for the real thing. But for now, I'm grateful to at least be able to tell whether friends or family are texting me due to an emergency or just for laughs by glancing at my lock screen.