iOS 27 code shows Apple's Siri can swap in Claude or GPT-5.6 as its model
- Code sleuth pdfu found private iOS 27 and macOS Golden Gate frameworks in which Model Delegation lets Claude appear as a Siri extension, the same way the built-in ChatGPT extension does.
- A second protocol in Model Manager Services lets an inference provider replace Apple's server-side Siri model outright: GPT-5.6 receives Siri's planner prompt and tool definitions, makes tool calls that perform system actions, and Siri presents the answer in its own interface and voice.
- In pdfu's demo, Claude set a reminder through Apple's Reminders app by handing the system action back to Siri, and separately produced a CSV file that Siri itself cannot handle.
- The "Ask..." menu ships only with the ChatGPT extension in the macOS 27 Golden Gate Release Candidate, Apple has not opened the model delegation entitlement to third parties, and the feature is not front-facing to users.
- The EU's Digital Markets Act, which the European Commission says requires third parties to get effective access to features Apple's own services enjoy, may have shaped the design.
Hacker News opinions
That would be really cool if you could route your local model through it. I figure that's the end goal given where their hardware is heading.
Hmm, then why is none of this available in the EU?
Because the EU wants broader access to the deeper layers, all the apps a user installs, and Apple doesn't want to hand that over.
There's a difference between Apple being able to swap the model in code and Apple letting end users pick which model to use.
This looks like the prototype meant for the EU and maybe China. My guess is it's basically ready and Apple is playing chicken with the Commission.
Don't they need something like this for China anyway, for compliance?
Siri and Alexa would be way more useful if you could hook them to ChatGPT. Alexa+ already runs an Anthropic model, probably Sonnet.
This is a clever platform play. Make Siri the central access point for every AI workflow and make the models interchangeable, and Apple has a real weapon in the AI race.
Fair, but this was not plan A. They failed hard at their own models and still ended up in a good spot because of everything else they have.
Honestly an abstraction over which AI to use is baseline good engineering, even if they never ship the switch.
They're probably designing for local-only versus hybrid versus cloud-only depending on hardware, so this flexibility buys them a lot of future options.
Any hint that Siri can connect to arbitrary MCP providers?
I think they went with local tool calling into your apps behind a Siri AI API, not HTTP MCPs, at least for now.
Devil's advocate: when a non-Apple LLM gives garbage, who does the user blame, Apple or OpenAI? That's exactly why they want to own the experience.
If you're savvy enough to change the default, you know which LLM you picked. Nobody blames Apple when Google search in Safari returns junk.
News at 11: developers write decoupled code.
If that's happened at every place you've worked you're luckier than you realize. And they wouldn't write it this way if they never expected another provider.
Now let me point it at an OpenAI-compatible endpoint on my LAN, a Mac Mini running Hermes. My personal data and queries shouldn't leave the network. This should be a default option.
Thanks EU for forcing this, I guess it was possible all along.