Apple says it is taking a different approach to AI than many other companies in the tech industry. In an interview with Mostly Human after WWDC 2026, Apple’s software chief Craig Federighi and marketing chief Greg Joswiak, explained that Siri and Apple Intelligence are designed to be useful tools, not digital companions.
As AI chatbots become more popular, some companies are creating systems that encourage users to spend more time talking with them. When asked if people could use Siri as an AI boyfriend or girlfriend, Federighi gave a clear answer, no.
“Quite the opposite, because as you may know, if you use many of the existing chatbots, they’re really focused on engagement to a large degree. And sycophancy, right? They kind of want to pull you in. They might encourage you to reveal things about yourself, and then use that as a basis to establish a connection,” Federighi said.
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He further added, “We view it quite the opposite. I mean, the way that we have designed Siri, Siri really wants to say ‘Listen, that’s not what I’m here for, right? I’m here to help you. I can help you get things done. I can help you learn about the world.’ But if you try to engage Siri as a romantic partner, Siri’s not up for that. Siri’s 100 percent not into that.”
Joswiak said Apple does not want to add AI features simply because AI is popular. The company believes AI should work quietly in the background and improve existing products.
“We like when technology disappears, right? You just focus on what you want to do, or you focus on the content. And it’s the same thing with AI. (…) We don’t do AI for AI’s sake. ‘Hey, look at us, we’re doing AI.’ It’s how does AI make everything better? And that makes our products better, our features better,” Joswiak said.
He explained that Apple does not want people to become “prompt experts” just to use AI features. Instead, the goal is to make products smarter and easier to use without changing how people normally interact with their devices.
Privacy is a key part of Apple’s AI strategy. Federighi stated that user data stays under the user’s control and is not shared with Apple.
“I think it’s a challenging thing for a lot of people to understand the distinction between what your iPhone knows and what, say, Apple as a company knows. Your iPhone is yours, right? Your data is yours and it stays on your phone and your control and Siri is using it for you. Apple doesn’t get to know any of this stuff, and that is very different than I think most players in the space, and I think super important,” he said.
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