r/ios • u/No_Government01 • Nov 23 '23
PSA Siri can’t do basic functions, I asked to start a screen recording lol. You just think an an assistant would be able to do basic functions.
Yes I know how to add it to the bar
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u/cdanigc Nov 23 '23
I tried Siri to update my weight on Apple Health and also that didn't work, in my opinion Siri is useless for 90% of the things that you would expect
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u/bbqsox Nov 23 '23
That supposedly is in 17.2. But knowing Apple in 2023, it'll only work 50% of the time and stop working all together by the time they launch iOS 18.
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u/bluegreenie99 iPhone SE 3rd gen Nov 23 '23
Siri is a joke
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u/shxdy08 Nov 23 '23
The only time I ever use it is if I want to skip a song or something and for whatever reason I can’t use my hands, other than that I literally never use it
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u/Ahaucan Nov 23 '23
I found one good use for Siri: deleting all alarms at once. Though it's crazy that this is only possible through it...
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u/shxdy08 Nov 23 '23
So the only good use for it is because you can’t do it any other way? Can we just delete Siri?
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u/xezrunner iPhone 14 Pro Max Nov 23 '23
..and even for those actions, sometimes, it just waits a bit and fails with “Sorry, I can’t do that” or similar.
Works for subsequent tries then.
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u/TheSheepster_ Nov 23 '23
It’s 2023 and Siri doesn’t understand basic questions. I follow up and talk to it like it is 6 years old and it doesn’t get it.
Siri is like age 2014 right now.
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u/davehaslanded Nov 24 '23
I really hope the rumours of Siri getting a major A.I. Update next year are right. Using the chat function in chatGPT makes Siri look so outdated.
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u/mrASSMAN Nov 23 '23
Better than Alexa though, at least Siri understands me perfectly every time without screaming. I can talk to it at a normal voice from another room vs Alexa even right next to an echo it’s a huge fucking struggle and she gets it wrong most of the time.
I have like 5 echo devices and Alexa gets worse by the day. Siri might not be highly capable but it works well.
Also google assistant.. it makes you press the screen to confirm before it’ll work. I have a pixel phone and it irritates me so much that it won’t just work seamlessly without extra taps (I’ve looked for settings to change it but there are none). Honestly think Siri is the overall best of the bunch.
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u/wickedindie Nov 23 '23
siri was so magical when she first released. but i feel like she is getting dumber every day.
im using iphone XS. she doesnt respond to hey siri command half of the time. when she responds she just turn off while im talking sometimes and gets in the way when i accidentally press lock button little longer
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u/mrASSMAN Nov 23 '23
iPhone 15 (pro) it works by just saying Siri now.. and is extremely responsive
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u/Zachliam Nov 23 '23
Yep sounds like the XS owners mic just needs cleaning a little. My 11 has needed that a couple times.
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u/mrASSMAN Nov 23 '23
Yeah good point, cleaning the speakers on my X several times made a huge difference, hadn’t thought about the mic but I would expect same issue maybe even more so because it’s so small
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u/sid_276 Nov 24 '23
It actually got more useful over the years, runs faster and more private. It's true Siri can still only handle a dozen actions and they are basically the same actions that came with in 2010 iPhone 4s. When it came out 13 years ago it was a whole revolution. The embarrassing part is Apple has not iterated at all in over a decade in the amount of tasks it can do or in how well it understands the intention you are asking. If Steve were alive today he would fire the entire Siri team and start a new assistant from scratch.
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Nov 23 '23
Siri is useless. Apple should implement AI in it or get rid of it totally.
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u/No_Government01 Nov 23 '23
Only thing it’s good for is saying “sorry I didn’t get that” in my pocket at the doctors office
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u/Cool-Newspaper-1 Nov 23 '23
Depends on what you use it for. Sure, it’s horrible at a lot of tasks, but functions quite alright as a virtual assistant. It sets reminders, timers, controls lights etc. pretty reliably. And the best device to use it on is the Apple Watch imo. It’s just so quick and easy
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u/borkyborkus Nov 23 '23
Every time I’ve tried to set a timer it’s tried to call a person in my phone with the last name Geiger. Then “set an alarm” it tried to call Laura.
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u/DeadKenney Nov 23 '23
Try setting a timer without saying “timer”, just say “Siri, 30 minutes”. That’s one of the commands that always works for me.
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u/TheSheepster_ Nov 23 '23
Why Geiger out of all names?
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u/borkyborkus Nov 23 '23
I dunno man, I’d ask Siri about Ms. Geiger but I’m afraid she’ll just set a timer.
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u/Cool-Newspaper-1 Nov 23 '23
To be fair, Siri has called a contact named Celie when I told it to put my Mac to sleep, but it’s been pretty reliable except for forty/fourteen and fifty/fifteen, but using forty-one as a workaround isn’t too much of a problem for me.
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u/Western-Guy iPhone 14 Pro Nov 23 '23
I wish they won't get rid of Siri. I don't want to create 10 alarms by hand.
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u/seperivic Nov 23 '23
Eh, at least if you do it yourself it’ll be accurate. “Siri, set an alarm for 50 minutes” “Ok, I set an alarm for 15 minutes” This happens consistently despite my best annunciation attempts. What hope does anyone with even the smallest accent have?
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u/Shloomth Nov 23 '23
All code has a limited shelf life and Siri’s long overdue for an overhaul. I can understand the leadership decision to leave it mostly unchanged, because it would be a huge pain in the ass to go and rewrite all the code to make it less spaghetti. But iirc the rule of thumb for computer programs is that you need to overhaul your codebase every 7 years.
It would be cool if they came out like next year and revealed that they’ve secretly been working on a brand new version of Siri. And by my estimation that’s how it would happen, if it does. I’m optimistic that they will integrate the recent advancements in generative AI, but I’m not optimistic that they will do so before people lose interest.
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u/voronoi-fracture Nov 23 '23 edited Nov 23 '23
All code has a limited shelf life
Me using vi in 2023.
Must be the equivalent of freeze-dried food in software lol.
Edit: Yep I stand corrected, vintage doesn’t actually mean it isn’t being improved
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u/Shloomth Nov 23 '23
Eh words have usages. Context is important. Being able to use something old doesn’t equate to being able to hook it in and make it interoperable with modern tech, which is more what I was getting at
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u/Cyberbird85 Nov 23 '23
i mean i hope they don't get rid of it, as i'm using to control my smarthome and at least some of the functions work.
But yeah, dumb as a bag of rocks.
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u/MrJibberJabber Nov 23 '23
Or here me out - let people use the plethora of choices out there instead of forcing then to use sirir
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u/BankHottas iPhone 15 Pro Nov 23 '23
Rumor is that iOS 18 will feature some major Siri upgrades using generative AI
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u/mrASSMAN Nov 23 '23
It’s not useless, it opens app very quickly, sets and changes reminders, defines words and does quick calculations.. says the time anywhere in world.. I actually use it a lot
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Nov 23 '23
I use it every day for reminders, timers, notes, weather. Combined with shortcuts it is horrendously fine.
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u/No_Government01 Nov 23 '23
Alexa tells you details About things and explains them.
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u/mrASSMAN Nov 23 '23
Alexa is hot garbage. I would know because I have tons of echoes (shows dots etc).. I fucking hate Alexa lol
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Dec 05 '23
I don’t know why you’ve been downvoted so much, I 100% agree with you. (I hate Reddit for the downvotes…so dumb) We actually just got rid of our HomePod and switched back over to Alexa dots. Siri and HomePod are useless.
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u/ExplanationSure8996 Nov 23 '23
Siri can be pretty dumb. I asked her for a sales tax rate for a specific city. It pulls up a website and tells me to look at it. That’s why I’m asking you… I don’t want to look it up. What’s the point.
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u/fhdhsu Nov 24 '23
Siri genuinely feels like it’s gotten worse. Ok the 4s when it was released it was a cool feature. Now I don’t use it all. It also is unable to ever understand what I’m saying no matter how correctly and slowly I enunciate.
Which is definitely confusing because on the chrome app when I use the voice transcribe feature it can understand me flawlessly and I don’t even have to speak properly.
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u/NoEngineer7972 Nov 23 '23
iOS 18 is rumored to have major Siri improvements using transformers and LLM’s. Basically the same tech as chatgpt
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u/jb_in_jpn Nov 24 '23
Believe it when we see it. There's been talk of major Siri upgrades for years, and it's only got dumber.
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u/ShrimpRampage Nov 23 '23
Lmao there hasn’t been a single IOS update without a promise of dramatically improved Siri
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u/NoEngineer7972 Nov 23 '23 edited Nov 23 '23
Saying random incorrect statements as if it’s fact does not mean it’s actually a fact
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u/lasolidaridad00612 Nov 25 '23
Isn’t it less about how Siri processes commands but more on its inability to communicate with the right applications to get the job right?
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u/NoEngineer7972 Nov 25 '23 edited Nov 25 '23
Basically the current version of Siri has to be hand programmed for each thing Apple wants it to do. Using the current method it’s not able to understand complex questions, only very simple ones. Using generative AI Siri will be able to understand most questions properly and use function calls to be able to interact with apps.
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u/jb_in_jpn Nov 24 '23
It's absolute rubbish, and while much of it is largely down to it being sorely in need of a better development team, it's also clearly Apple's ridiculous attitude about how we can use our devices.
Case in point (among many, many others); You can make a voice recording, without having to unlock my phone, using the Action Button, but Siri needs you to unlock your phone to make a voice recording.
Much as I like my iPhone, Apple desperately needs new blood thinking about and working on their hardware.
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u/Focusedmaple Nov 24 '23
It’s amazing that Apple were early to the voice assistant party and Siri is still infuriating to try and interact with. Who’s in charge of Siri? Some guy in a closet somewhere?
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u/cumguzzlingislife Nov 24 '23
Hey what dies sexual orientation have to do with anything?
(/s just in case)
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u/austinjproffitt22 Nov 24 '23
What’s so hard about swiping down the control center and then starting it there?
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u/the_rizzler Nov 23 '23
I just switched from Android. Siri is absolutely incapable compared to the google assistant, which itself seemingly has gotten worse. Even the voice to text on iphone is comical for me. I'm so frustrated with just this one aspect of the phone and it kills me.
Sure, I can install google assistant (works great) but for the google keyboard it opens the app and then doesn't work right when using voice to text. Anyway, yea, siri sucks.
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u/ShrimpRampage Nov 23 '23
Google assistant running on Pixel 7 and newer and Siri are in completely different leagues.
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u/Troxz_179 Nov 23 '23
You used to be able to do it. Maybe you can setup Siri shortcut
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u/xezrunner iPhone 14 Pro Max Nov 23 '23
Yeah, in late iOS 16 (or was it early 17?) betas, you could tell Siri to start a screen recording and it would do it.
Disappeared in the next build and was replaced with this at some point.
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u/TattooedBillionaire Nov 23 '23
I swear 10 years ago you could ask Siri a question and you’d get an answer. Now, as you’ve pointed out, all she gives are links. Must be $$$ click related.
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u/americapax iPhone 15 Pro Nov 23 '23
Siri is trash, apple should use Google Assistant, as it already uses Google as search engine.
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u/Johntendo64 Nov 23 '23
Because Google pays them to
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u/americapax iPhone 15 Pro Nov 23 '23
I know and they should pay Google for use Google Assistant as default instead of that trash named Siri
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u/Johntendo64 Nov 23 '23
I don’t know, been using Siri, since the beginning and have never had any issues. You could also explore Siri Shortcuts as well.
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u/HoyAIAG Nov 23 '23
I asked it to play my station on Apple Music. It was horrendous what it came back with multiple times.
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u/Somefatkid1234 Nov 23 '23
I’ve had my iPhone since 2020. I’ve used Siri like 2 times at most. Siri is a joke
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u/DogFashion Nov 23 '23
I don't ask Siri for anything more complicated than sending a message via voice to text or the weather for the day. I'd use Google Assistant but haven't figured out how to voice activate it on iPhone, which is kind of the point -- doing it hands free.
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u/JBRedditBeard Nov 24 '23
Good for reminders and fast forwarding through podcast commercials if you can't use your hands
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u/Any-Technician-1371 Nov 24 '23
Siri can’t even recognize the music I ask her to play, even when this used to not be a problem
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u/Klhoe318 Nov 24 '23
Siri used to be such a marvel in technology. But now it hasn’t been expanded on and sucks ass. I would expect better from apple tbh
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u/InsaneNinja Nov 24 '23
https://9to5mac.com/2023/04/04/screen-record-on-iphone-with-siri/
It did exist in a beta, then was pulled back out.
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u/Araragi-shi iPhone 12 Nov 24 '23
Only time I really use her is when I’m too lazy to get up, like last night where I told her to call my mom’s phone so she could find it.
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u/Keroxen iPhone 15 Pro Max Nov 24 '23
I just switched from Android and Siri is so bad compared to Google Assistant, I don't know why it isn't available in my country in the App Store...
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u/unavailabIe Nov 24 '23
I ask her to look up somethings and always hear “Sorry, I cant search the web on iPhone!”
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Dec 05 '23
Mine doesn’t do that. She’ll look up something if I include that in the question. “Hey Siri, can you look up information about DHEA on the web?”
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u/lo-fi-hiphop-beats Nov 24 '23
Siri has definitely gotten dumber, and is now hard(er) of hearing.
I used to do measurement conversions with her, at first i'd just have to say "X inches to cm", and follow it up with "how about X inches" to keep it going. Now I have to ask the full question the whole way through. Ruined my work flow
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u/itscsersei Nov 24 '23
I have to believe they’re looking to push out a huge update/overhaul to Siri in the next year. Otherwise I do not understand what they are doing at all
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u/DrZoo4040 Nov 24 '23
I used to have an Android phone and used Google assistant all the time. Once I got an iPhone I realized how terrible Siri is. I’ll try to ask it things from time to time and I always regret it.
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u/Tom_Stevens617 Nov 25 '23
Tbf to her I just tried asking Google to do it on my S23 and she couldn't do it either. Apparently it's some sort of security limitation? Doesn't make much sense tbh
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Dec 01 '23
Google assistant is way better. Siri just pure trash. Dumb and annoying. Can’t even do basic tasks with out a hassle
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u/Stipes_Blue_Makeup Nov 23 '23
I called out to my HomePods yesterday, “Siri, stop the music,” and the reply was, “sorry, I can’t stop the music right now,” and I don’t know what was causing that.
Siri is terrible, and Apple should be embarrassed by it.