We can wait on Apple Intelligence

Apple Intelligence is one of Apple's rare botched launches. It made the mistake of announcing one feature too many and showcased personalized intelligence.

That single feature set was meant to transform how you use your iPhone. It was an exciting tool and an excellent implementation of the AI that was otherwise generating garbage.

It never arrived.

That isn't to say that Apple won't soon have those features on iPhone. There is ample evidence and even a public announcement that Apple is committed to improving Apple Intelligence and re-releasing it in 2026.

I've been incredibly vocal about Apple Intelligence and its place in the overall AI race from the start. While it is a different approach and implementation, I find it difficult to classify it as "behind" others in the space. Yes, even to this day.

I was disappointed to find out that personalized intelligence was getting pushed back by at least a year. And here we are a year later and it seems nothing may actually release until the fall.

While not ideal and disappointing to the eager customer and fan, I still applaud Apple for the restraint. It could have flooded our iPhones with mountains of AI trash from the start or spent any amount of time chasing gimmicky bloatware.

Instead, it limited its Apple Intelligence changes since 2024 to very specific feature sets. We gained ecosystem-wide translation, ChatGPT integrations in Image Playground, and Visual Intelligence in the screenshot tool.

The little tweaks and additions across the system have been useful. I still enjoy using notification and email summaries to help me triage what's worth addressing in the moment and what isn't. The Proofread tool continues to be a boon even as Grammarly continues to be creepy with its AI tools.

I'm aware that it could and should be better. However, I think Apple's need for near perfection in everything it releases and its inability to get there with AI is emblematic of the state of AI, not Apple's engineers.

Another interesting result of Apple's slow implementation of AI has been how the industry has changed. There was an AI boom driven by investor dollars and hype for products that didn't do what they promised and never would.

Somehow, Apple was "behind" because it didn't join the hype train in promoting impossible ideas and claims of sentient machines.

Thankfully, the industry has seen a slow deflation. While we hoped for a pop, which may still come, it seems AI has taken a turn in the public eye. Interest is waning and investors are taking notice.

Rumors indicate that Apple is working to make the iPhone and its other products into powerful AI mediators. Apple Foundation Models will still be the backbone of Apple Intelligence and Siri, but they'll be able to make API calls to other AI apps you have installed for specific processes.

The personalized intelligence Apple promised in 2024 is still coming. And while competitors have made similar feature claims in the intervening years, they've yet to deliver something quite as powerful.

Apple's patience in implementing AI tools may pay off in the end. The industry is seeing a deflation, public interest is dropping, and regulators are stepping in.

Instead of bearing the financial and regulatory burdens of becoming one of the AI grifters, Apple got to wait things out. It now knows what the public wants from AI and how to implement it best.

There's still a small chance iOS 26.5 could get the new Apple Foundation Models trained by Gemini. We're two betas in, and that hasn't been tested yet, though I doubt Apple would drop the feature without some kind of announcement.

There's also the chance that Apple won't release the new models during a beta. It may be a bit more complicated than it is worth to have two sets of models targeting different operating systems at once. Though, that is kind of how it will work in China.

We'll see what Apple does here. If we have to wait for WWDC and a fall release, so be it. AI isn't the thing that will transform the world the way the grifters promised. It is something that Apple should invest in, but not chase like a crazed lunatic.

I have some patience left in me. Let's see what Apple shows us in the AI space once it is good and ready to do so.