Apple AI Updates: May 18, 2026

1. iOS 27 Siri app will ship with auto-deleting chats and a Genmoji beta flag

Apple. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported on May 17 that the rebuilt Siri app in iOS 27 will include an auto-deleting chats feature as a baseline privacy default, putting Apple’s chatbot ahead of the major consumer AI apps on data-retention defaults. Gurman also flagged that Siri itself may land as a beta inside iOS 27, even after two years of delays since the original Apple Intelligence Siri promises, and that Genmoji is in line for a substantial upgrade. The reporting tracks Apple’s posture of pre-briefing through Bloomberg in the weeks before WWDC on June 8, where the productized rollout is expected. Source

2. Apple positions the Gemini-backed Siri relaunch as a privacy and on-device story

Apple. AppleInsider’s reporting on Apple’s 2026 AI push frames privacy and data security as the explicit differentiator for the Siri and Apple Intelligence relaunch, even though Apple is leaning on Google Gemini models for the underlying capabilities. The angle is that Apple plans to keep more of the personal context and conversation history on-device or inside Private Cloud Compute, and to surface controls like auto-deleting chats and per-app data scoping as defaults rather than buried settings. The narrative is Apple’s answer to two years of criticism that its AI roadmap stalled because privacy constraints made the original Apple Intelligence Siri impossible to ship on schedule. Source