Apple is getting closer to the Siri reboot it announced at WWDC in June 2024, and the launch appears to be tied to iOS 26.4. Apple plans to unveil the updated Assistant in the second half of February. According to Bloomberg, iOS 26.4 is expected to enter beta testing next month and ship publicly in March or early April.
The upgrade is intended to take Siri beyond simple voice commands and generic responses. The assistant should be able to access personal data and screen content to complete tasks, a kind of everyday help that Apple has been promising for years.
What is still missing is the practical small print. Apple hasn’t clearly outlined the device’s eligibility, regional availability, or the exact limits of what Siri can access when it starts working with personal context.
A reality check at the end of February
Apple’s February demos are the first real pressure test. Whether it’s a large event or a tightly controlled briefing, perhaps in Apple’s New York media loft, the point is the same: show the assistant how to do repeatable work.
This is important because context functions can look great in a single script flow. You will only gain trust if the assistant reliably understands what you mean, connects it with what you see and can complete the task without any detours.
Gemini is the accelerator
To integrate these features into iOS 26.4 on this schedule, Apple reportedly needed Google’s Gemini. Internally, Apple has referred to the system as “Apple Foundation Models Version 10,” which makes it appear to be a self-developed leap even with external technology.
The underlying model is said to contain around 1.2 trillion parameters and be hosted on Apple’s private cloud compute servers. This setup suggests that Apple is relying on cloud scaling for the most difficult requests, which can speed progress but also raises questions about responsiveness, coverage and how the experience performs in different regions.
What you should consider with the beta version
Once the iOS 26.4 beta is available, there will be no more marketing language. It’s about whether the assistant can act on the personal context and not just recognize it, and whether it continues to work after the tenth attempt.
Pay attention to how Apple explains privacy controls, what data stays on the device versus private cloud computing, and which iPhone models have full functionality. If Apple answers these questions clearly in February and the beta confirms it, the spring update could be the most significant Siri change in a decade.
