Apple's WWDC 2025: A Crucial Moment for Apple Intelligence and AI Strategy

Will Apple repent-or repeat-its mistakes at WWDC 2025?

Now we know that June 9 is the day Apple will kick off WWDC 2025. I've been covering WWDC since before Steve Jobs came back to Apple, and this year is shaping up to potentially be the most interesting and certainly most dramatic version of Apple's most important event of the year. If you didn't know already, WWDC (which stands for Worldwide Developers Conference) is important for more than just developers. It's literally Apple's New Year's Day, the day that the company rolls out its plans for all of its platforms for the next year. With the impending release of iOS 18.4, macOS 15.4, and the rest, we are at the tail end of last year's cycle. Work at Apple is now shifting even more to the stuff we'll be using over the next year, beginning with the announcement of new features and new decisions on June 9. Last year's event, which featured the rollout of Apple Intelligence-including, yes, some features that never ended up shipping-was certainly dramatic. But at the same time, we all pretty much knew what was coming: Apple was desperate to be seen as a player in the AI game, and so it was going to blow that horn as loud as it could. This year's fascination is more subtle: What now? Doubling down on Apple Intelligence? Apologizing for last year's, er, overexuberant promises? Changing direction? Staying the course? The last year has flipped the table on Apple's usually conservative and careful platform-building plans. This year's possibilities are wide open. Last year's rollout of Apple Intelligence wasn't subtle, and by most accounts, it was a rush job after the company realized it was behind in the LLM game. This last year has been bumpy, with some features working okay, others embarrassing Apple, and of course, some not showing up at all. It's never been more evident that Apple is not a company that is capable of rushing operating-system features into production in a matter of a few months. (Maybe it should be, but that's a different topic.) But it's been more than a year since that fateful decision was made, nearly ten months since WWDC 2024, and five months since Apple Intelligence began shipping to customers. So, what has Apple learned from this entire experience? This is the key question, and while the company won't tell us the answer directly, we should all watch closely to see how it alters its approach. My guess is that Apple will consider its primary goal of WWDC 2024-to create broad knowledge of "Apple Intelligence" as a brand name that makes Apple vaguely seem in the AI game-to have been achieved. Those who are knowledgeable about the current state of AI will roll their eyes and cite dozens of ways in which Apple is nowhere near the cutting edge of AI, and they're not wrong. But I think that in the broadest perception of Apple as a company, consumers are vaguely aware that Apple says it has AI. And even people closer to the tech industry have to admit that Apple seems to have a huge desire to get into the AI game, even if it's stumbled out of the blocks. That's why this coming year, Apple Intelligence will probably shift to more of a clean-up and consolidation phase. The last year was messy. Bits of Apple Intelligence were jammed into places where they didn't quite fit or make sense. I hope that Apple will refine the existing tools, ship updated (and hopefully much improved!) versions of its own models, and also focus on shipping the stuff it promised last year that it couldn't deliver this year-if it can. If it can't, if those features prove to be elusive, that will continue to be a black eye for Apple-but it needs to own it and move on. As a result, I expect that Apple will only announce a small number of new Apple Intelligence-derived features, not the fusillade of features we got last time. After a year, I hope that the company will understand better what it's capable of accomplishing in a single year. Lost in all the Apple Intelligence hype last year was the somewhat astonishing fact that at its developer conference, Apple unveiled a load of AI features that offered almost no way for app developers to get in the game. The biggest story for developers at WWDC 2024 was App Intents, which would allow apps to better integrate with all the features that Apple has now admitted it can't ship. So in hindsight, WWDC 2024 had almost nothing for developers at all. This needs to change, and WWDC 2025 is the place for it to happen. App developers should view Apple platforms as the best places to build AI-enhanced apps. That's good for Apple. The company has invested a lot in creating hardware that's pretty solid for running AI applications (thanks, Neural Engine). The next step should be offering developers access to Apple-blessed ML models on its devices, and easy systemwide integration with external models from Apple and third parties. Apple built Apple Intelligence for itself; it's time to turn the tables and let the app developers start innovating. Speaking of external models, Apple has spent a year with a single integration-to ChatGPT. It's a great model that's very useful for lots of stuff, but it's not without serious competition. Apple should announce that it's integrating many more models, letting users choose their favorite or allowing the operating system to pick the right tool for various jobs. The company also needs to get over its overwhelming fear of users using these tools-the current implementation of ChatGPT integration requires multiple warning steps unless you dig into settings and shut them all off. By all means, Apple needs to give users the ability to opt out of all AI queries and content. But given how broken Siri is these days, it might also want to make it much easier to opt in and kick most queries to remote sources. Until Apple has a chance to beef up Siri, the Siri agent should only offer to perform the most basic functions and kick everything else out to an LLM. It's a quick fix, even if it will require Apple to swallow a little pride. Apple just rearranged the executive ranks and put Mike Rockwell in charge of Siri. If you're hoping for major Siri announcements at WWDC 2025, though, I have a stern warning. We all want Siri to be fixed. But if Rockwell is just now being put in charge, it means that any announcements for Siri fixes in the next year would probably be just as rushed as the Apple Intelligence features were last year! As a result, I expect that Apple will be a little less aggressive on Siri, while still making some promises for early in 2026. As I detailed a few paragraphs ago, perhaps the best solution is to turn more Siri queries over to other LLMs in the meantime just to stop the bleeding. I realize the temptation to make big claims about changes to Siri will be great. But... we were just here last year. I hope Rockwell rights the ship, and Siri gets in gear, but I want to see Apple show that it's learned its lesson about overpromising and underdelivering. There have been lots of recent reports that this year's OS updates will feature a new design language. It sounds good to me. Here's how the cycle goes: A company releases a major new redesign. It pushes things a bit too far in the interest of making change. Over the course of a few years, the most extreme stuff gets sanded off, and everyone settles in. Then many years pass, and new doodads get added here and there as one-off additions until a decade passes and your clean new design is now a monstrosity. It's time for a new, consistent design. While a lot of people are reporting that the new design language is "based on visionOS," I don't think that's the case. My guess is that Apple has been spending years working on this design, and it's been built from the ground up to work across all of its devices... including, logically, the new Vision Pro. But Vision Pro shipped before the new design was ready to roll out elsewhere, so it became a testbed for some of the ideas of the new design. As a result, I expect aspects of this design to be reminiscent of visionOS-but they're all from a common source, not just being copied from visionOS. I do think that it's time for a fresh design, and for Apple to extend its design philosophy across all of its operating systems. While a lot of Mac users might cringe at the idea that the Mac is going to just end up looking like an iPad, I actually think that this process should be a good thing for Mac users. A good, thoughtful design system should take into account the things that make all of Apple's devices unique-while bearing a family resemblance and working similarly, like they're all from the same company. I would argue that a lot of the most glaring design sins in macOS in the past few years have come from iOS designs just getting sprayed into macOS without a whole lot of thought. If Apple's designers have done their jobs, this time around, the Mac will be considered along with iOS, and they'll make the right decisions for each of Apple's platforms. Another thing to keep in mind: Apple is really good at playing the long game. Over the last few years, I've had several conversations with Apple executives who have explained that when Apple designs a new processor, it knows exactly what devices will be using that processor. This is one of the advantages of the Apple silicon approach. Well, Apple's new design language presumably has been designed with some understanding about where the company is going with its product designs in the future, not just in 2025. If Apple is planning a folding iPhone, this design should have factored that in. If there are touchscreen Macs on the horizon, this would be the time for the design to take that into account. Finally, a lot of pundits will say that Apple's new design, when it's revealed in June, is a smokescreen designed to distract people from Apple's rough time with Apple Intelligence. This argument is about as convincing as saying that Apple changed the iPhone's design a month before shipping, or altered the design of a chip six months before it arrived. So much of what Apple does takes years of pre-planning to accomplish, and that includes this new design. But that said, if the new design gets people talking about something other than the broken promises of Apple Intelligence, Apple's not going to complain one bit.

Apple's WWDC 2025 keynote will be the most important one in years -- here's why

Unless you're an Apple developer who builds software for all the different devices the company sells, it's easy to feel like you can give the annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) a miss. Oh, maybe you'll catch up on the recaps after the event, but the idea of sitting through an event aimed squarely at app makers and other developers doesn't sound like your type of rodeo. Well, Apple has set a date for WWDC 2025. And when this year's event gets underway with an opening keynote on June 9, I'm going to suggest it's something you'll want to tune in for. I'm not talking about the software previews that figure to dominate the agenda, though from early leaks, it sounds like those are going to be very interesting. iOS 19, in particular, is tipped to get the most significant interface overhaul in a dozen years, and since the goal appears to be a more seamless experience across different Apple devices, you'd imagine the software running the iPad and Mac are set for revamps of their own. And I wouldn't count on any hardware news either. Hardware hasn't been totally absent from recent developer conferences, but to date, no big launches are rumored for WWDC 2025. And whatever does get announced will probably be for the benefit of that assembled audience of software developers, like a Mac Pro M5 preview. No, the reason WWDC 2025 looms large on the calendar is what Apple promised at last year's developer conference -- and what we're still waiting for. Last year's WWDC served as the launching pad for the Apple Intelligence features the company would introduce on iPhones, iPads and Macs later that fall. After the usual round of software previews, Apple talked up the new suit of AI tools that would allow you to do things like improve your writing, create images from scratch and even form a new relationship with a suddenly more aware Siri digital assistant. I don't think it's unfair to Apple to describe the Apple Intelligence rollout that's been taking place since last fall as a mixed bag. Yes, many AI-powered features promised last summer are now a part of iOS, iPadOS and macOS -- some of them have even proven to be quite useful, though opinions remain divided on how essential these initial Apple Intelligence additions have been. (Put me in the "they're easy to overlook" camp.) Most notably though, many of the promised improvements to Siri -- upgrades Apple touted and even used in iPhone advertising -- have yet to materialize. Apple wanted to upgrade Siri so that it was more aware of the context of your phone screen and able to act on those details. The assistant was also supposed to be able to interact with different apps of your phone. Those improvements have now been delayed. It's unclear when they might show up, though some reports say we may not see the so-called Siri 2.0 emerge until next year -- possibly as an update to the initial iOS 19 release expected later this fall, possibly not even until iOS 20. You would hope that Apple would offer some clarification on that. More specifically, WWDC 2025 affords Apple the opportunity to reset the discussion around what's coming to Siri and when. And it's an opportunity Apple really needs to take advantage of. There's a tendency at these kind of events to accentuate the positive -- talk up future features and ignore past missteps. I don't think Apple should do that. It needs to be very clear about what went wrong with its Siri reboot and how things are going to be different this time around. I don't mean that the WWDC 2025 keynote has to turn into some confessional. But Apple still needs to acknowledge missteps if it wants to maintain credibility among users that bought into last year's presentation and might be feeling a bit burned by what they wound up with. When I talked to analysts a little bit ago about the delay to Siri features, the consensus opinion seems to be the problem isn't Apple missing a deadline or delaying something that had been promised. The mistake was putting out ads asserting that the Siri revamp was going to be a done deal, when it clearly wasn't even close to being ready for prime time. That's a good way to break trust with users, and failing to recognize that publicly is an even better way to make sure that trust remains broken. Besides detailing how Siri will get from what it is now to the more capable assistant Apple described when first unveiling Apple Intelligence, it's also important for the company to spell out what's next for AI on its devices. Normally, that would be self-evident, but amid rumors that Apple's not planning any new Apple Intelligence features for iOS 19 and other software updates this year, the company needs to make it clear that its AI tools are going to continue to progress. One thing Apple has certainly been clear about since the beginning of Apple Intelligence is that its AI push would be a work in progress. The first Apple Intelligence features that debuted with iOS 18.1 last October weren't an end point, but rather the start of more capabilities coming to the iPhone elsewhere. Even as it tries to get the Siri revamp back on track, Apple needs to show that it's still looking forward with its Apple Intelligence plans at WWDC 2025. And that means new capabilities that try to gain more ground on what Google and Samsung devices can already do, to name just a couple rivals that are well ahead of Apple at this point. All told, it should be a very interesting keynote at WWDC -- even if you're not a developer.

3 things Apple needs to do at WWDC 2025 to save Apple Intelligence, and why I'm convinced it will

Apple just announced WWDC 2025, its annual developer's conference, with a keynote highlighting the next year of software at its core. This year's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) takes place on June 9, and there's more at stake this year than maybe ever before. Why is WWDC 2025 such a big deal? I hear you ask. Well, coming off the back of Apple's public delay of an Apple Intelligence-powered Siri, we're about to hit the year anniversary of Apple's initial AI announcement, yet we still don't have access to its magical powers that were originally showcased. At WWDC in June, Apple will have to address the delays and highlight the future of Apple Intelligence to try and win back the credibility that has taken a hit over the last 12 months. By June, we'll only be a few months away from the launch of the iPhone 17, and if Apple wants consumers to trust in its next flagship iPhone, I think Apple Intelligence needs to be ready. The world will be watching WWDC 2025 to see how Apple claws itself out of the AI-fuelled mess it's created, and here are three things Tim Cook and Co should do to get the hype train going again. 1. Address the ghosts In my opinion, the very first thing that should be discussed at WWDC is the Siri delay. Now I know that's not very "Apple" to highlight mistakes but I think it would be incredibly refreshing to see Apple execs put their hands up and take responsibility for advertising a product that just wasn't ready. I highly doubt we're even going to get a mention of any delays, I'd actually expect we're more likely to get a timeframe on when Apple Intelligence-powered Siri will launch, glossing over any turmoil. As long as Apple lays out its plans for on-screen awareness, personal context, and app intents powered Siri, then I think we can move past this mess and start to think more positively about AI in the iPhone. I won't be satisfied unless we see an actual live demo of Siri working with Apple Intelligence and finally reaching the potential we were promised at WWDC 2024. I may be naive, but I'm optimistic that Apple will, in fact, showcase Siri in all its glory because if it doesn't and focuses on the rumored iOS 19 redesign, I'll be genuinely disappointed. This first entry into this list is almost a necessity, and until Apple is able to showcase the promised features, I don't know how we can move on. Fingers crossed, at WWDC 2025, we get a demo of Siri 2.0, a release date, and a newfound trust in Apple to deliver to its loyal fanbase. 2. Apple Intelligence 2.0 How can I think about Apple Intelligence's second wave of features when the first wave hasn't rolled out yet? AI development is so fast-moving that new features and capabilities are coming out almost daily, and that's very hard to cope with when your company is playing catchup. Apple needs to do something very special with Apple Intelligence at WWDC 2025; it needs to showcase some form of consumer AI tool that blows the competition out of the water and reaffirms Apple as THE tech company to beat. Unfortunately, following the Siri failure, I'm not sure if I believe Apple is capable of AI software innovation in the way it has shown to be capable of hardware innovation over the years. Siri's 2.0 release would bring the iPhone up to speed with its competition powered by Gemini, but for Apple to pass Google's smart assistant, Siri needs to do more. Personally, I want AI on the iPhone to blow my mind and make the mundane of my daily life a breeze. If Apple takes its Apple Intelligence offering to the next level by showcasing Siri powers we haven't even seen yet, say AI-powered task management that's on a whole new level, then WWDC will get all the right headlines. 3. Make AI relatable Apple's tagline, "AI for the rest of us." is excellent. Those words were the number one thing I remembered from last year's Apple Intelligence reveal. That said, AI still feels like a gimmick and alien to many people, and I think Apple needs to find a way to make it connect with individuals like we've not seen before. Too many people overlook AI or simply don't use it on their devices because, quite frankly, it doesn't make their lives better. If Apple is going to promote that incredible slogan, it needs an AI strategy that backs it up and highlights why Apple Intelligence is worth using and not worth missing out on. Nearly a whole cycle has gone by, with those who have invested in an iPhone 16 for Apple Intelligence disappointed, and those who are waiting to upgrade still probably not sold on the idea of Apple's AI. If Apple can make AI relatable by highlighting new features that connect with the audience, then not only will it make Apple Intelligence a success, but it will also push users to purchase new iPhones come September. You might also like