• Apple joined the AI smartphone race with its ‘Apple Intelligence’ suite of GenAI features, aimed at boosting productivity and generating new content.
• The Apple Intelligence features are deeply integrated within the Apple ecosystem devices such as iPhones, iPads, Macs and Vision Pro.
• In the first of our three-part series, we explore the practical applications of Writing Tools, Summarization and Notification Management, highlighting how Apple has integrated these features system-wide, and where there is room for improvement.

Artificial Intelligence (AI), especially with Generative AI (GenAI), is on track to become the new differentiator and value-add for the smartphone industry. While Samsung got the headstart in early 2024 with its Galaxy AI, launched through partnerships with Google and Qualcomm, Apple and others since then have been rolling out their AI capabilities. According to Counterpoint Research’s AI 360 Service, GenAI smartphone shipments are likely to exceed 400 million in 2025, capturing one-third of the global market. We also expect Samsung and Apple to dominate the GenAI smartphone market in the early years.

Alongside the launch of the iPhone 16 series, Apple announced its AI strategy with Apple Intelligence. But Apple has been gradually rolling out these capabilities, starting with iOS 18.1. We have been testing Apple Intelligence features across the powerful iPhone 16 Pro, MacBook Pro 16 (M1 Pro) and Apple Vision Pro for the last couple of months, and will analyse them in a three-part series, with this first part focusing on Writing Tools, Text Summary and Notification Management.

Apple Intelligence Compatibility: iPhones, iPads, Macs and Vision Pro for cross-device play

Apple Intelligence is available across the iPhone 16 series and iPhone 15 Pro/Pro Max devices running iOS 18. It is also available for iPads running iPadOS 18 with the A17 Pro SoC (iPad mini), and iPad models with the M1 SoC and later. All Macs powered by the M1 and later chips and running macOS Sequoia get Apple Intelligence features. But that’s not all, Apple’s Mixed Reality headset Vision Pro also gets some of the Apple Intelligence features with the Vision OS 2 update. Apple’s tighter hardware and software integration and wider ecosystem make it possible to have a consistent experience across platforms and devices.

If you have a compatible device, head over to Settings > Apple Intelligence & Siri and toggle the switch to turn on Apple Intelligence on your iPhones and iPads. In case of a Mac, head over to the Apple icon on the top left and then Apple Intelligence & Siri before toggling to turn it on.

Writing Tools: Compose, Proofread, Refine - AI Help Across Your Apps

Most AI tools are designed to boost productivity. To test the capabilities of Apple Intelligence Writing Tools across devices and apps, we created a series of prompts to try them out. In general, the Writing Tools work across the OS and almost every app, from Notes to Email, Microsoft Teams and Text Messaging to social media platforms like X (formerly Twitter), but except Meta apps like Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. Below is our analysis of Apple Intelligence Writing Tools.

To use the Writing Tools, you will first need to select the text or double tap on empty space and then tap on Writing Tools (or the Apple Intelligence icon) depending on which app you are in.

Describe your change: Beyond rewriting, rephrasing and changing tense

The first option in Writing Tools, “Describe your change”, lets you do multiple things, like changing the way the text reads, paraphrasing it, or changing its tense. To test the tool, we wrote a small caption for an X post reviewing a restaurant and asked AI to change it to sound like a food reviewer’s post. This feature needs an internet connection to work.

Next, we asked the AI to paraphrase a sentence in three different ways, followed by asking it to change the tense from past to future, both of which it did effortlessly.

“Describe Your Change” is a versatile and effective tool for quick text tweaks like tense and tone, paraphrasing and even hashtag suggestions.

Beyond Spellcheck: Refine Grammar, Structure and Word Choice, all on-device

The next feature lets you proofread the text for spelling and grammatical errors, including tense, punctuation and typos. It can also rectify sentence structure and use different choices of words to make it sound better.

The rewrite option paraphrases the sentences differently, as seen in the examples below. Once the changes are done, you can accept them, which will replace the sentence, or you can individually review and accept suggestions.

On a Mac, we tested using some grammatically incorrect sentences on Microsoft Word, and Apple Intelligence Writing Tools could correct them accurately, though we wish there was a shortcut to invoke the writing tools. Currently, one needs to Select the Text > Right Click > Writing Tools to access these AI tools.

From polishing text to correcting sentence structure and word choice, it is a reliable and valuable feature, though a better-placed shortcut on Mac would enhance usability.

Adjust your tone, keep it concise, and communicate clearly with on-device processing

The next feature lets you change the tone to make it sound friendly or professional. If the text seems too lengthy, you can use the concise tool to make it short and crisp.

This Apple Intelligence feature provides a reliable way to modify the text to match the desired tone and shorten lengthy content, all offline.

Have inspiration? Stuck on words? Go beyond a blank page using ‘Compose with ChatGPT’

Do you often find yourself staring at the screen, struggling to articulate the perfect text or email? You have the core idea, but the words just don't seem to flow in the way you envision? It is a common frustration most of us have, and this is where Apple’s ‘Writing Tools’ come in handy to help you compose texts and emails effortlessly.

In the iMessage app, the AI tool can help you compose text messages. Just double tap on the blank space to invoke the Writing Tools options and select the last option “Compose”. This feature needs internet connectivity and uses ChatGPT to compose text messages for you. For instance, we had a meeting with a client to discuss a product launch strategy, and to craft a text message, ChatGPT asked for meeting details like the client’s name and key points discussed. You can even ignore these details if you are not comfortable sharing them. As you can see below, AI has crafted a nice message – a little lengthy for a text message and in email style, but still up to the mark.

You can even use the tool in the email app to compose emails. For instance, we gave a prompt to create an introduction summary for a newsletter with this week’s top articles and videos, and it crafted a nice email, easing off most of the task.

It even suggested some other alternatives, like adding “Don’t Miss Out” in the headline and more to convey a sense of urgency to ensure more clicks.

Clearly, these productivity tools greatly help in reducing your work, though one should not just copy and paste as it is, but make tweaks to fit the individual style.

But there is more. You can even use the Compose with ChatGPT feature in apps like Notes, Pages, Word and Email to create fictional stories or so. In the Notes app, we invoked Writing Tools to write a story about a robot that aspired to be a footballer and who also played a crucial role in winning the league title for the team. ChatGPT wrote the story and also gave suggestions to highlight the robot’s emotional journey or quirky traits. The possibilities with Writing Tools and ChatGPT are endless.

Leveraging ChatGPT, the compose feature offers a powerful way to generate text from scratch across various apps, proving helpful for overcoming writer's block.

Summarization: From Long Reads to Key Points, Easy-to-Consume Byte-Sized Content

The summarization tool is a great addition to the AI features that quickly condenses lengthy web articles and email threads, so you spend less time scrolling and more time understanding the key information. Though summarizing web pages is a few-step process, we would have loved to have an easier way to go about it. Here is how it works – on the Safari browser, open the web page, tap on the reader icon on the bottom left of the URL bar, tap on Show Reader and then tap on Summarize.

There is another way to do it, and this one works across any web browser or even in the Notes app or a Word document where you want to summarize text. Just select the text, tap on Writing Tools and then tap on Summary. It will generate a small summary of the selected text, which you can also copy and paste and share over email or text or save in Notes.

You can also have the summary listed in a few key bullet points or even convert it into a table for easy understanding, especially helpful when reading about market share numbers and trying to understand the growth drivers and more.

We even tried it on the Apple Vision Pro, and it worked well. Though selecting the text and invoking the Writing Tools is a bit cumbersome till you don’t get used to the gestures, it is otherwise pretty neat and easy to use.

Tired of endless and lengthy email chains? Apple Intelligence on iOS can summarize email threads to provide a clear overview of the discussion, thus helping you stay on top by focusing on the essential information and saving valuable time in the process. However, this only works when connected to the internet, and on Apple’s default email app for now. On top of every email or email thread, you will find a Summarize option. Just tap on it and you will get a summary within seconds.

From long-form web articles and endless email threads, Apple’s summarization tool effectively condenses information, though Safari implementation could be more streamlined.

Call and voice recording, on-device transcription and summary for easy recall

One of the new features Apple rolled out with iOS 18 is the capability to intelligently handle voice. When on a phone call, you can now record the audio, which is stored in the Notes app. After the call, you can head over to the Notes app to listen to the audio, read the transcript and even generate a summary of the call. Supported languages include English, Spanish, Italian, Japanese, Korean and a handful of others.

Users can start the call recording by tapping on a record icon on the top left when on a phone call. As a privacy measure, the recipient will also be notified that the call is being recorded. While the voice transcription works offline without needing an internet connection, for the summary, an internet connection is needed.

The Notes app also allows you to record voice notes and Apple Intelligence can then transcribe them into text. This tool can come in handy during meetings or when you are interviewing someone, or just want to take voice notes.

We had no major issues with the transcription accuracy, but as you can see above, some terms like “WWDC” were transcribed as “wwDC”. Further, in one instance, “Apple Intelligence” was transcribed as “App Intelligence”. Therefore, it is not fully accurate, but does most of the job.

The ability to record calls, transcribe them and offer a summary adds convenience to Apple Intelligence AI suite tools, though transcription accuracy isn't always perfect.

Notification Management: Cut Through Notification Overload with Short Summary and Priority Alerts

Landing after a long-haul flight or waking up to a flood of overnight notifications can feel overwhelming. To help manage and streamline these notifications, Apple Intelligence has two smart features – Notification Summary and Priority Notifications. AI can group the least urgent notifications into a concise summary, thus allowing you to catch up on what matters most.

But in our experience, these notification summaries were not quite helpful, especially when you have 15 emails, 20 WhatsApp or text messages and more. As there are so many conversations, the summary is not helpful. But if you just have a limited emails or texts to catch up, then the AI does a decent job.

With Priority Notifications, the AI identifies and highlights the most important, time-sensitive information from the apps, so you don’t miss out on urgent notifications. For example, someone just sending you a WhatsApp or text message to say “Hi” or “Hello” will go in the notification tab. But when some sense of urgency is detected, AI ranks that conversation higher and displays the same as Priority Notifications, as seen below.

Apple has done a good job with ‘Priority Notifications’ to highlight important alerts, but the summary needs to be contextual and smarter.

Final Thoughts

• Although Apple has been late in introducing GenAI features, it has thoughtfully integrated them system-wide and across devices for a more consistent experience.
• The concept of Notification Summary is promising, but its effectiveness seems to diminish when there are too many notifications. Perhaps, future iterations could explore a more granular categorization to intelligently group them into categories like “Transactions”, “Promotions” and “News”, making the summary far more digestible and actionable.
• Throughout our usage, we liked how Apple Intelligence features work and how they are thoughtfully designed and implemented. However, there can be further improvements for easy access and operation in the next iterations.
• Apple Intelligence handles the processing of 6 out of 10 Writing Tools use cases on-device to maintain privacy. However, for certain complex tasks, it leverages a private cloud to deliver the results. But how will it work with third-party developers to maintain Apple's privacy and data security commitment will be important to watch.
• Apple Intelligence boasts impressive system-wide integration with Apple's apps and select third-party offerings. However, the real test, and a significant opportunity, lies in how Apple collaborates with key developers such as Meta, given their existing LLM capabilities, to fully unlock its potential.
• As Apple largely emphasizes on-device AI and private cloud compute for data safety and security, how seamlessly it transfers the learnings and personalized experiences when moving across devices or upgrading will be a key area to watch.
• With WWDC 2025 weeks away, all eyes will be on iOS 19 and how Apple improves the AI features further.
• Also, as Apple Intelligence features evolve, the monetization strategy will be a key driver for Apple's services revenue growth.