Apple is reportedly set to boost its iPhones with new tools powered by generative artificial intelligence. iPhone users should be able to make use of these before the end of the year, via iOS 18.

The Cupertino-based company is said to be developing a number of AI-based innovations for the next major iOS update, due for roll-out in the fall. To bring its project to fruition, Apple has spared no expense, acquiring around 20 specialist startups in recent years, according to the Financial Times. And there could still be more to come.

Since the emergence and widespread roll-out of generative artificial intelligence, Apple has been particularly quiet on the matter. Things could change this year, though, with the arrival of intelligent functionalities on the brand's smartphones.

No details have yet been released, but AI could, for example, be used to manage documents and photos stored on the phone and in the cloud. As for Siri, this voice assistant could be powered by a particularly rich language model for ever more precise and contextualised responses.

In any case, Apple will need to keep up, as its major rival Google has already announced several new features for searching the web on smartphones, boosted, in some cases, by generative AI. Google plans to let users search at any time from any format (video, photo, text) without having to switch applications. Note that the new Samsung Galaxy S24 is the very first smartphone to exploit other possibilities of Gemini, Google's multimodal language model.

As for Apple, look out for more information at WWDC, the firm’s annual conference for developers, scheduled to be held in June.

 - AFP Relaxnews