The pivot nobody (officially) predicted
Until recently, Apple had positioned Siri as a contextual system-integrated assistant, explicitly differentiating it from full-screen chatbots like ChatGPT. Then iOS 27 arrived with Siri AI: a dedicated app, a conversation-bubble interface, a paperclip for file attachments. The chatbot format, in other words.
Federighi at Apple Park
During a tech talk held at Apple Park during WWDC week, Craig Federighi addressed the question directly, explaining why Apple decided to embrace a chatbot-style interface for Siri AI. According to 9to5Mac, Federighi acknowledged the contradiction with previous statements and justified the choice by pointing to the need for a persistent conversational context that the traditional Siri interface — designed for short commands — could not adequately support.
The strategic shift in detail
The Siri AI app in iOS 27 preserves system integration (the old Siri still exists as a quick-access entry point), but adds an extended mode where users can hold long conversations, attach documents and images, and receive detailed responses. It is an indirect admission that competitors' conversational models had pointed in the right direction, and that Apple simply took longer than expected to get there.