Apple Hiring for 'Answers' Team Working on 'ChatGPT-Like Search'

[MacRumors]

Apple is hiring engineers for an "Answers, Knowledge, and Information" team that is working on improving Siri, Spotlight, Safari, and more.

As of writing, Apple's careers website has more than a dozen job listings for the team across the U.S. and China. For example, Apple is looking to hire a Staff Machine Learning Engineer to help with "improving Siri's ability to answer personal domain questions." The job listing says the team develops large language models that are "responsible for answering users' questions using their personal documents with privacy at the forefront."

That sounds a lot like Apple's personalized Siri features, which were delayed until 2026. However, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman says there is more at play here.

In his Power On newsletter today, Gurman said he was told that the team is in the early stages of developing a "new ChatGPT-like search experience," and it is apparently even exploring a "standalone app" for such functionality.

"While still in early stages, the team is building what it calls an 'answer engine' — a system capable of crawling the web to respond to general-knowledge questions," wrote Gurman. "A standalone app is currently under exploration, alongside new back-end infrastructure meant to power search capabilities in future versions of Siri, Spotlight and Safari."

Gurman previously reported that Apple was developing a more conversational version of Siri, but he said that it was delayed until at least iOS 27. This would be a more ChatGPT-like version of Siri that is powered by a large language model.

For now, the only thing that Apple has announced is the more personalized version of Siri, which will have better understanding of a user's personal context, on-screen awareness, and deeper per-app controls. For example, Apple showed an iPhone user asking Siri about their mother's flight and lunch reservation plans based on info from the Mail and Messages apps. Evidently, though, it looks like Apple has even bigger ChatGPT-like ambitions.

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Article Link: Apple Hiring for 'Answers' Team Working on 'ChatGPT-Like Search'

 

[Sheepish-Lord]

Can't wait for some new hire to "borrow" some unknown/modified language model, pretend like it's their own, Apple eventually rolls it out and inevitably gets sued. Just a mess...might as well add Gemini to what Google already pays Apple to have Google search as the default.

 

[Line_Noise]

A traditional search engine that actively excluded generative slop pages would be far more useful at this point.

 

[now i see it]

the computer industry is scrambling. Scrambling for ai. its an existential threat. Fail, & you're gone.

 

[P-Rip]

With this many companies working in the AI space, I just hope “Hot Dog/Not Hot Dog” can be perfected in our lifetime.

 

[Taq'aix]

It’s glaringly obvious that they’re still fumbling in the dark with no idea what they’re doing. iOS 27? Seriously? Why even bother splurging on a new iPhone this September? This is an absolute train wreck of embarrassment.

 

[palmujukka]

So lightning fast from Apple! If Apple is really at recruiting stage, I doubt that we’ll see the personalised Siri next year.

 

[ipedro]

Joz saying that "Apple doesn't want to build a chatbot" shows how out of touch Apple leadership is and how they got here. After Steve died, Apple has had no visionaries at the top. Steve Jobs' last acquisition was a chatbot — Siri —and nobody from Tim Cook down to his VPs understood the future as conversational computing as Steve Jobs envisioned on his deathbed.

They're now paying the price and trying to catch up as others like openAI show them the future. Apple has too much money to be in any trouble but if they don't get better at envisioning 20 years ahead, they will be.

 

[turbineseaplane]

Tim says they are "making great progress" though!
He recommends upgrading to the latest iPhone, always!

 

[atomwork]

Maybe its me. but Siri is worthless to most people I know. Doesn't get half the stuff I want, or cannot do it due to limitations. I switched permanently to Grok 4... Apple C-Suite keeps sleeping too long on new cutting edge stuff until the train moved past them.

 

[Bustycat]

Already ChatGPT-like search by ChatGPT

https://chatgpt.com/?hints=search

 

[Taq'aix]

I’m excited about the prospect of OpenAI developing an innovative smart device that hopefully eventually will rival the iPhone. I’m sooo eager to move away from my Apple tech and embrace a fresh, AI-driven alternative that could redefine the smartphone experience.

 

[nfl46]

The heck. They should have been had a team like this in place. The Siri name is damaged. Lol. Hopefully they rebrand it in a couple of years.

 

[tim_apple]

I don’t think the personalized Siri will ever happen. Apple will keep delaying it and then water it down. Pure vaporware.

 

[macfacts]

Shouldn't they have did this one year ago!

 

[BigMcGuire]

I had high hopes for Siri. Now I use a different LLM. Would be nice if Apple let me integrate that LLM into my Apple experience (since I already pay for it).

 

[hagjohn]

What took them so long to hire people?

 

[airwalk331]

Maybe its me. but Siri is worthless to most people I know. Doesn't get half the stuff I want, or cannot do it due to limitations. I switched permanently to Grok 4... Apple C-Suite keeps sleeping too long on new cutting edge stuff until the train moved past them.

💯 Siri is pretty horrid. Issues I have with Siri:

-none of my Apple devices can figure out which should reply and so none do. This happens 25-40% of the time. I see all the screens light up and then go dark without doing anything else.

-“I found this on the web for…” perhaps the most infuriating thing to hear from Siri and this seems to be half the time. Siri should be able to tell me anything I ask it about regarding my iPhone.

-“I’m sorry, I don’t understand” - I get this 10% of the time

-“you’ll have to unlock your iPhone for that”

-Just doesn’t respond sometimes. I can’t figure out why this happens. I have to repeat myself 2,3 or sometimes 4 times.

 

[syklee26]

Apple is becoming an AI specialist search firm for Meta, isn't it?

 

[turbineseaplane]

What took them so long to hire people?

They keep leaving.

It's like trying to get folks onboard a boat that everyone keeps jumping off of.

 

[Peepeenuts]

Please don’t sell us phones based on future promises and it’ll be just fine.

 

[Plutonius]

Replacements for the people lost to Meta ?

 

[turbineseaplane]

Please don’t sell us phones based on future promises and it’ll be just fine.

This comment is "BUILT for Apple Intelligence"

 

[darngooddesign]

Tim says they are "making great progress" though!
He recommends upgrading to the latest iPhone, always!

Be really weird if the CEO of any company said "don't buy our latest thing".

 

[CatalinApple]

Replacements for the people lost to Meta ?

I think so. But if Tim Cook was smart he would have done everything in his power to motivate them to stay because Apple is serious about AI. Now that top talent is leaving Apple, Tim Cook takes everything seriously and urgent, but it might be too late, way too late.