Apple's new CEO is reportedly pushing to turn Siri into a real AI agent, faster

John Ternus, who recently took over as Apple's CEO, is reportedly pressing the company to move faster on AI, including turning Siri into an actual agent, ZDNET writes, drawing on reporting by Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.

In public Ternus is happy with the Siri AI launch, Gurman says. In private, he's urging software chief Craig Federighi to speed up.

Where Siri stands

The new Siri is a much better voice assistant. Gurman sees its ability to fix weak passwords automatically as a bit agentic already. But it doesn't yet match agents from AI-first companies that organize tasks, operate your computer or write serious code, though those rivals are uneven: ZDNET rates OpenClaw and Claude Code as very capable, Google's Gemini Spark less so.

Apple's slow pace has arguably helped its image amid the backlash against AI bloat and rising hardware prices, and its privacy-first approach stands out next to data-hungry agents like Meta's Muse. Gurman's warning is that if AI companies pair their software with devices designed from scratch for assistants, Apple's usual advantages could start to fade.

What's next

Near term, Ternus's push will probably just deliver what was already promised. Siri still lacks the advanced in-app actions Apple announced in 2024, which would let third-party apps plug into Siri. Gurman notes Apple started talking about that feature again in the first iOS 27.3 beta.

An agentic Siri could, for example, read a whole long email itself instead of only what's on screen. If it got good enough, some Apple users might stop installing ChatGPT or Claude, though ZDNET thinks the gap is still wide.

Scoreboard update: Humans +1. Apple's careful pace on AI looks like a strength, and the boss wants to speed it up anyway.

Stay undead.