Recently, Apple released an update to its operating systems that introduced the beginnings of a new suite of artificial intelligence tools called Apple Intelligence.

Apple has been talking about Apple Intelligence since it was first mentioned back in June at their Worldwide Developer Conference.

The first Apple Intelligence features finally made it to consumers with the release of iOS 18.1, iPadOS 18.1 and MacOS 15.1.

Apple users may or may not see the new features, as you’ll need a recent device.

Apple Intelligence is only compatible with iPhone 15 and 16 models, iPads with an A17 Pro or M1 or later CPU and any Mac with an M1 or later CPU.

If you have a compatible Apple device, and you’ve updated to the latest version of the operating system, you’ll still have to opt in to activate Apple Intelligence inside the system preferences. The option you will find is to be added to the Apple Intelligence waitlist.

Why a waitlist?

The server and network infrastructure to handle the AI requests is new, and I think Apple wants to keep an eye on the system capacity.

That said, I clicked to join the waitlist on the first day and I received a notification that I’d been approved in about an hour.

So, what is included?

Writing Tools to help you summarize, proofread and rewrite text to change the wording or tone. You can choose to make your copy sound more professional, friendly or concise.

You should find the writing tools if you select a block of type and right-click with your mouse. Writing Tools will be listed in the pop-up menu.

You’ll also find Smart Reply options in Apple Mail, and you’ll see summaries of email conversations.

Summaries and smart reply will also appear in the Messages app notifications.

Photos gets some new features, including Clean Up, which lets you circle objects you’d like to remove. I cleaned up the background in a picture of my wife and I was really impressed at the results; the cleanup only takes a few seconds.

Users can also search with natural language in the Photos app. You can search for things like "Christmas in Chicago" or "red convertibles" and the returned photos were surprisingly accurate. The searches even include your videos.

Siri gets enhancements including typing your Siri queries and asking Siri questions about how to use your Apple products. (Siri, how can I make text bigger on my iPhone?)

Apple will be releasing more Apple Intelligence features in future software upgrades, so you may want to turn on automatic updates in the Software Update system settings.

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