The slow trickle of iOS 27 leaks continues with seemingly obvious upgrades that are being painted as part of a desperate move to catch up with competitors. Instead, they appear to be business as usual.
Apple announces new features for iOS each year during WWDC, and sometimes, early builds lead to leaks of features being tested. While these leaks frustrate Apple engineers that would prefer to keep them a surprise, they're sometimes obvious and predictable.
According to a new leak from Bloomberg, Apple will announce improved Writing Tools, a wallpaper generator, and the ability to generate Shortcuts with natural language input. While these are not groundbreaking features, they're part of a larger effort to ensure users have access to various AI tools across their iPhone.
The report goes out of its way to suggest that Apple is "racing to catch up with hardware rivals" while referencing Google's Android Show filled with pre-announced features. Several of these, like importing grocery lists to apps from a first-party tool like Reminders, already exist on Apple platforms without the need for AI.
Ignoring the unnecessary color of the report, the new features are predictable, if useful, additions to iOS. They also hold up to my repeated assertion that Apple's AI efforts will remain out of the way for those that don't want to use them.
Writing Tools updates
Writing Tools were introduced during WWDC 2024 as a part of Apple's initial AI push. They're able to generate or summarize text, but I've taken to using the Proofread function instead of paying for Grammarly.
Writing Tools could get more proactive in iOS 27
That feature is set to get an upgrade in iOS 27 that will bring Grammarly-style checks to the tool. Writing Tools already checks for spelling errors, punctuation mistakes, and similar basic changes, but it doesn't look for syntax errors.
It doesn't appear that Writing Tools will operate differently when invoked by the user, but one poorly explained part does stick out.
The report mentions that Writing Tools will appear from a translucent menu at the bottom, provide users with the ability to apply or ignore changes, and see edited text alongside revised text. That's already in place today.
What's new appears to be a briefly mentioned toggle that "pauses grammar checking." That sounds more like the feature can be set to run automatically within a text field rather than relying on activating a specific tool.
Today, Writing Tools are found via a right-click menu or in the text suggestions box above the keyboard. Apple may bring more of the Writing Tools controls to the top of the keyboard.
Again, none of this is particularly revolutionary. In fact, they sound right out of my own wishlist for the Writing Tools feature.
More obvious updates
Apple previously introduced a whole new system for customizing the iPhone Lock Screen and Home Screen. It involves a wallpaper picker that pulls from Photos, preset wallpapers, or custom ones based on the weather or selected emoji.
A new AI generation tool for wallpapers could appear
It is only natural that Apple bring Image Playground into the mix. It's already being used for generating images for Apple Invites, for example.
Then there's the returning rumor about natural language processing for generating Shortcuts. This is an often repeated rumor that never came to fruition.
It seems iOS 27 will finally include the feature. Users will apparently be able to speak Shortcuts into existence rather than having to build them manually.
Apple's more proactive Siri was also meant to suggest Shortcuts based on common and repeated tasks. Today, Apple Shortcuts is a useful tool, but only if you know how to build Shortcuts or get them from elsewhere.
Negative framing
I suppose it is fair to say that Google and Samsung have announced AI features, and even released some, for their smartphones. By that basic reality alone, it is easy to say that Apple is "behind" in this AI race, even if those features make the Android experience arguably worse.
However, I have never encountered a real human being, on the internet or otherwise, who has said these Android AI features were useful. Sure, they love their AI tools found in apps, but the on-device tools touted in these keynotes get crickets as far as I can tell.
It probably doesn't help that the requirements for those features are incredibly specific. The fragmented nature of Android prevents feature parity across devices.
When I think of desperation, I imagine a company putting AI in a cursor so that everything becomes an AI interaction. But of course, no one would actually do that. Right?
Googlebooks will have an AI cursor
Apple has seen record sales and demand in spite of it not drowning its products in unnecessary AI features. In fact, I believe part of the success can be attributed to the exact opposite.
The idea that Apple is somehow flailing internally is silly to me. Of course, the company would have preferred not having a two-year delay on some AI features, but that's a different story.
Apple's products are primed to be the best home for AI models, if you choose to use them. Not only will Apple ship its improved Apple Foundation Models and APIs for endpoint agents, it will give users the ability to do business as usual.
The only ones I see "racing to catch up" are Apple's competitors who are hoping for some time in the spotlight before the inevitable AI collapse. At that point, Apple will have its iPhone while these AI-first companies will have to pivot to some other grift.
