It’s that time of year again, where Apple gets together with thousands of developers for their annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). The 2024 event follows the post-covid format of a smaller gathering at Apple’s HQ in Cupertino with a larger audience online for the keynote and developer sessions across the week.

Several thousand developers will be watching the keynote from Caffe Macs on Monday Morning California time, kicking off at 3am Tuesday AEST.

While the event is most certainly a software focussed one, the keynote has been known to produce some surprise announcements including new product previews, and launches.

Last year the Apple Vision Pro was announced, over six months before it was made available in the USA.

For 2024 the rumour mill doesn’t seem to indicate any hardware announcements, but there’s one thing all eyes are focussed on from Apple – that’s AI.

Apple Intelligence – the AI play

In recent days some rumours point to Apple labelling their AI play as “Apple Intelligence” – which makes some sense, but perhaps not as much as “Siri AI”.

The world is remarkably well connected with and accepting of AI – so it makes sense for Apple to play into that space.

Ask any Apple executive and they’ll say they’ve been working with AI on devices for years, though their “ML” or “Machine Learning” chips, going back a decade. These processors or processing components are now better known as Neural Processors, again, something Apple has been doing for a while and something companies like Microsoft are catching up to and passing Apple on quickly.

So what will Apple Do?

Apple is very strong on privacy, so expect anything they do to be couched with that word. Either cloud based or on-device they will mention privacy a LOT

Frankly, we have no idea what they are going to do, but what they need to do is clear to any observer:

  • Siri has to be smarter – Let’s face it, Siri is amazing at controlling functions of the phone like setting timers, alarms and a range of things. But general knowledge is sadly lacking. You get better results from Google and Alexa smart assistants, and some impressive stuff from Google Gemini and ChatGPT/CoPilot AI assistants. Siri needs to grow up, and learn.
  • AI has to become a helping hand – We know Samsung has some cool editing features to get text re-written by your phone in a new style or manner, as well as translations and much more. iOS 18 needs some “AI help” on board. Perhaps, that’s what will be the Apple Intelligence.
  • AI has to do something cool – On a Copilot+ PC you can generate images on device. Apple needs a party trick like that – on device.

All eyes on Apple and AI – they cannot simply rest on “we’ve been doing AI for years” any more.

New for iPhone with iOS 18

While we don’t anticipate radical design changes, there is a solid rumour that we’ll be able to place icons anywhere on the home screens. Currently icons all start and the top and cascade down. Sounds like a small thing, but it will allow a stack more personalisation.

Other than that, much of what we’re expecting will have that “AI” or Apple Intelligence at it’s core. Things we see on other platforms, coming direct to the iPhone.

Removing unwanted objects from photos is something Google did years ago, expect Apple to catch up there.

Notifications can get out of control, so perhaps some AI summaries of “what you missed”.

And expect AI assistance in forming replies to emails or messages, and even summaries whole websites for you.

Developers will get iOS 18 this week, the rest of us will see it in September when the next iPhone drops with iOS 18 on board.

Mac, iPad, Watch and TV

It will be within Mac OS where Apple probably showcase a wider range of “helpful” Ai technology. Like writing help, perhaps even strong integration into Apple Mail to help you manage that inbox. That could be a game-changer.

iPad features will primarily follow iOS, while Watch will focus on health and safety features.

Apple TV isn’t likely to change much, perhaps expect some new show promos to drop at the keynote.

Apple Vision Pro

The “Spacial Computing” device Apple announced at this very event 12 months ago went on sale only in the USA.

There are reports of some additional global availability, but no strong rumours of Australia being part of that second wave.

If we are on the list, all eyes on the price – it’s going to be eye watering.

We can also expect Vision OS to get an update, with Vision OS 2 aimed at things developers perhaps gave feedback on over the last year.

New devices?

We’re due a few things, like Mac Mini, Mac Studio, even MacBook pro with newer processors, but expect that to come later in the year, tomorrow will be all about AI – we hope.

I’ll have all the details from Apple WWDC 2024 tomorrow, here at EFTM.com

Trevor Long travelled to Cupertino as a guest of Apple