Apple ditches its popular “Hey Siri”

The American giant wants to simplify its voice control system. However, changes are not expected for several months.

“Say Siri”. These two words are familiar to iPhone, iPad or HomePod owners. Since 2011, they have been able to respond to user requests through voice commands.

Calling a contact, sending an SMS, doing a web search… the possibilities of commands through Siri are many, but the practicality of the process is always questioned. Apple wants to make ordering easier. The solution is very simple: replace the famous “Hey Siri” with a simple “Siri”.

A technical challenge

This change may seem trivial, but it’s a major challenge for Apple engineers. The big problem is getting Siri to understand that an order is being sent by calling a name. Regardless of the user’s language or accent, “Hey Siri” is more likely to be understood by the voice command system. Some owners of Apple products, for example, can successfully activate Siri by prompting words close to their ear, such as “series” or “Syria.”

The Apple brand’s teams have been working for months to train the artificial intelligence as best as possible to understand orders sent on the first try. But they need to be understood well.

Love the competition

Apple wants to get closer to what its competitors have already been doing for years. Amazon asks its users only a simple “Alexa” to activate its voice assistant. Microsoft has simplified its authentication method by switching from “Hey Cortana” to “Cortana”.

Google, for its part, is asking its users to say “OK Google” or “Hey Google”. However, the brand’s connected objects can be reactivated for brief requests without repeating the magic activation formula.

Apple is part of changing this sentence so that you can string together commands without saying “Hey Siri” over and over again. This is especially useful for those who have home automation installed in their homes, who do not need to call the voice assistant multiple times to fulfill their requests.

While at Twitter and Elon Musk, we build new features in days, at Apple, we take our time. The magic formula change may not take effect until 2023 or 2024 Bloomberg.