Apple to scrap ‘Hey Siri’

Apple is working on a project to ditch the phrase “Hey Siri”. Instead, you’ll just need to call Apple’s digital assistant by name, dropping the ‘Hey’ from the start of the phrase.

Mark Gurman, who seems to have an amazing pipeline of information from the Apple mothership in Cupertino, says that “The company is working on an initiative to drop the “Hey” in the trigger phrase so that a user only needs to say “Siri”—along with a command. While that might seem like a small change, making the switch is a technical challenge that requires a significant amount of AI training and underlying engineering work.”

It’s a good indicator of how complex artificial intelligence and voice recognition are when what seems like a quite minor change requires a special engineering team.

What’s interesting to ponder is why Apple wants or needs to make this change. Apple’s longer term plans are hard to fathom. Often, when Apple makes a seemingly small change it’s part of a much broader and grander initiative. Could this change be part of Apple’s push into virtual and augmented reality? Or is it a way to simplify an experience and make it to more language and culture inclusive?

In any case, Gurman says we’ll no longer be saying “Why Siri” either later this year or early in 2023.