In one of the season’s biggest tech deals, Apple and Google are teaming up to overhaul the Siri voice assistant. Apple plans to leverage Google’s 1.2-trillion-parameter AI, aiming to launch the revamped Siri by next year.
According to Bloomberg, the companies are close to a deal under which Apple would pay around US$1 billion per year for access to Google’s technology. This advanced AI model is expected to significantly enhance Siri, surpassing the capabilities of Apple’s current system.
After evaluating other third-party AI models such as Gemini, OpenAI's ChatGPT, and Anthropic's Claude, the iPhone manufacturer chose to partner with Google. Apple intends to use a temporary solution until it can introduce its own models that are sufficiently robust to handle the tasks.
As part of the collaboration, Google’s Gemini model will handle Siri’s summarization and task-planning features, enabling the assistant to analyze information and manage complex commands. At the same time, certain Siri functions will continue to operate on Apple’s own AI systems.
Apple is developing a customized version of Google’s Gemini system, building on the existing 150-billion-parameter model that currently powers the cloud-based Apple Intelligence platform. The upgrade is designed to significantly enhance computational performance, enabling Siri to process complex data and context with far greater accuracy.
The project, internally known as Glenwood, is led by Mike Rockwell, the creator of the Vision Pro headset, alongside Craig Federighi, Apple’s software chief. The revamped voice assistant, codenamed Linwood, is expected to debut with iOS 26.4.