iOS is set to become the epicenter of a battle between personal digital assistant technologies from Apple, Google, and Microsoft, as the Windows maker revealed Tuesday that Cortana would join Siri and Google Now on Apple's mobile platform.
Microsoft's forthcoming standalone Cortana app on an Android device
Cortana's eventual appearance on iOS was outed in a new video detailing the features of Microsoft's forthcoming Windows 10 Phone Companion system, which will allow iOS and Android users to synchronize data with a Windows 10-based computer. A release date is not yet known, with Cortana labeled simply "Coming soon."
"We're also gonna enable all Windows 10 PC users to take the intelligence of that Cortana system with them onto not just their Windows phone, but also their iPhone or Android phone as an app you can install on one of those devices," Microsoft's operating systems chief Joe Belfiore said during the video.
Cortana --Â which Belfiore for some reason calls "the world's only personal digital assistant" --Â was first announced last April alongside Windows Phone 8.1. Word of an iOS port surfaced in March of this year, with some sources suggesting that it may debut with an enhanced backend based on an artificial intelligence project dubbed "Einstein."
When Cortana does appear on the iPhone, it will join Apple's Siri and Google Now as personal assistant options for iOS users. Apple is known to be working on Siri enhancements of its own, notably bootstrapping a new internal search team that will enable Siri and Spotlight to more efficiently search for information.