Apple builds ChatGPT-Style search tool as it rethinks Siri and Spotlight

Apple is hiring for over a dozen AI roles in the US and China to boost its Siri and search capabilities

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Apple is ramping up its artificial intelligence ambitions with the hiring of engineers for a new "Answers, Knowledge, and Information" team.

The unit is focused on enhancing Siri, Spotlight, Safari, and other services — and could form the backbone of a broader push into ChatGPT-style AI search.

According to job postings on Apple’s careers site, the company is recruiting for more than a dozen roles across the United States and China. Among the listings is a position for a Staff Machine Learning Engineer tasked with improving Siri’s capacity to answer “personal domain questions.”

The roles involve developing large language models (LLMs) designed to respond using a user’s private documents — with privacy protections as a key design element.

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The initiative appears to be part of Apple’s broader strategy to catch up in the generative AI race. While the company has already announced a personalized Siri update due in 2026 — with better context awareness and per-app control — insiders say more is coming.

In his Power On newsletter, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports that Apple is in the early stages of building a “ChatGPT-like search experience.” Dubbed an “answer engine,” the project aims to crawl the web and provide real-time responses to general knowledge queries. Notably, a standalone app is also under consideration, alongside an overhaul of back-end infrastructure to support improved search functionality in Siri, Spotlight, and Safari.

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Although a fully conversational Siri, powered by a large language model, is reportedly delayed until at least iOS 27, Apple’s long-term plans suggest ambitions that go far beyond what has so far been publicly unveiled.

Currently, the company has only confirmed plans for the personalized Siri update — showcased at WWDC 2024 — where users were seen asking Siri about their mother’s flight details and lunch plans based on information pulled from Mail and Messages. However, Apple’s latest hires and development efforts indicate it is preparing for a much more powerful AI-driven future.