What is Apple Intelligence and why does it run on your device?
Apple didn't just add AI - they rebuilt their entire device ecosystem around it, with a privacy twist.
The answer
Apple Intelligence, announced at WWDC in June 2024 and rolled out with iOS 18.1, is Apple's on-device AI system integrated across iPhone, iPad, and Mac. It uses compact models (around 3 billion parameters) that run locally on Apple Silicon, keeping personal data on-device rather than sending it to the cloud. For more complex tasks, Apple's Private Cloud Compute routes requests to Apple Silicon servers with cryptographic guarantees that data isn't stored or shared. Features include system-wide text summarization, generative image tools, a deeply enhanced Siri backed by large language models, and contextual awareness across apps - all designed around Apple's privacy-first philosophy.
Source: Apple
- apple
- on-device ai
- privacy
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