Plenty of chatbots will happily play boyfriend or girlfriend. Siri AI will not. In a new interview on the Mostly Human podcast, Apple software chief Craig Federighi drew a hard line for the assistant Apple just unveiled at WWDC. “If you try to engage Siri as a romantic partner, Siri’s not up for that. Siri’s 100 percent not into that,” he said.
Federighi also took a swipe at the engagement tactics of rival AI companies. “They’re really focused on engagement to a large degree. And sycophancy, right? They kind of want to pull you in. They might encourage you to reveal things about yourself,” he said. By contrast, he framed Siri’s job in strictly practical terms. The assistant exists to get things done and to help you learn about the world, not to keep you talking.
No AI for AI’s sake
Marketing chief Greg Joswiak echoed that philosophy in the same conversation. “We don’t do AI for AI’s sake. ‘Hey, look at us, we’re doing AI.’ It’s how does AI make everything better?” he said. Moreover, he stressed that users should not need prompt-engineering skills. “We want to meet them where they’re at,” Joswiak added.
Privacy got its usual Apple framing too. “Your iPhone is yours, right? Your data is yours and it stays on your phone and your control and Siri is using it for you. Apple doesn’t get to know any of this stuff,” Federighi said.
The Siri that finally shipped
The comments land days after Apple introduced Siri AI at WWDC 2026, roughly two years after the original Apple Intelligence promises slipped. The revamped assistant brings world knowledge, personal context, and on-screen awareness across iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and Vision Pro. There is also an all-new dedicated Siri app. It uses iCloud to privately sync conversation history, so a chat started on a Mac can continue on any other Apple device.
Not everyone gets it at once, however. Apple has confirmed that Siri AI has no EU timeline for iPhone and iPad because of Digital Markets Act compliance work. For everyone else, a notably businesslike assistant is on the way. It will help you plan dinner. It just will not tell you that you look nice tonight.
