In July 2020, before the media latched on to all-things AI, Patently Apple posted a patent report on this subject matter titled "Apple has been Granted a Patent for a Future Environmental Sensing Chip for the iPhone & Apple Watch that uses AI." In July 2021 we posted a report titled "Apple is Quietly Developing AI tools in an effort to play catch up with Open AI's ChatGPT, Google's Bard and others." While most Apple fans aren't aware of Apple's work with generative AI, they recently joined the U.S. AI Safety Institute Consortium (AISIC) focused on the safe development and deployment standards of generative AI.  

At WWDC24, Apple is expected to roll out a major new version of Xcode, Apple’s flagship programming software focused on generative AI. The new system will operate similarly to Microsoft’s GitHub Copilot and use artificial intelligence to predict and complete blocks of code, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans are private. That simplifies the programming process for software development, potentially saving time and money.

Currently, Apple is pushing some engineers to try these new AI features internally as part of a “dogfooding” effort — when a company uses its own products — to make sure they work properly before releasing them to outside developers.

Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, has told his teams to develop as many new AI features as possible for this year’s operating system updates.

He’s also tasked his lieutenants with drumming up features that use the technology and has made top deputy Sebastien Marineau-Mes a point person for the effort. Apple executives demonstrated the AI functions to the board late last year, with Marineau-Mes conducting much of the presentation, the people said. The Xcode work is being overseen by another Federighi lieutenant, longtime software engineering vice president Andreas Wendker.

Apple’s next iPhone and iPad software updates — iOS and iPadOS 18 — will include a slew of new AI features, according to the people. The company is planning to tout the software, codenamed Crystal, as one of the most significant updates in the 16-year history of the iPhone.

It’s also planning to bring some AI features to the next version of macOS, codenamed Glow. Still, Apple aims to take a gradual approach to AI development, with some enhancements not coming for years. For more on this, read the full Bloomberg report by Mark Gurman.

Apple's smartphone competitor Samsung kick started 2024 with a big push into AI with the introduction of their Galaxy S24 Ultra smartphone, their first smartphone focused on AI as presented in the promo video below.

Other individual Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra AI features videos cover: "Circle it" (which is really a Google AI feature); Chat Assist;  Live Translate Calls; and Enhanced Zoom.

At this year's WWDC24 it'll be Apple's turn to introduce some magic of their own in the realm of AI and Apple fans just can't wait to see it all unfold.