Latest iOS 17 Beta Adds Support for Bilingual Siri Queries Mixing English With Hindi and Other Indic Languages

[MacRumors]

Apple yesterday released its first set of public betas for iOS 17, iPadOS 17, and macOS Sonoma, and these versions add new features for Indian users across platforms, including support for bilingual queries to Siri.

According to TechCrunch, users will be able to ask queries to Siri by mixing English with select Indic languages, including Hindi, Telugu, Punjabi, Kannada, and Marathi.

India-based users often speak a mix of languages in daily conversations, so the ability to mix English with Hindi and other Indic languages when querying Siri will be broadly welcomed.

TechCrunch also highlights some other improvements for Indian users, including:

• Transliteration support on iOS for Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, and Malayalam. With this expansion, Apple now supports 10 indic languages.
• Users can sign into Apple ID using their phone number instead of an email ID on iOS 17, iPadOS 17, and macOS Sonoma.
• A new built-in Punjabi dictionary to get definition of words and phrases across platforms.
• Users will be able to see up to 2,000 calls in the call history section including Facetime and WhatsApp calls.
• Filtering messages by known and unknown senders on iPad.

Public beta testers who have signed up for Apple's beta testing program can download the iOS 17, iPadOS 17, and macOS Sonoma updates now. Developers have had three betas so far, and the first public betas offer the same content as the third developer betas.

Apple is expected to release final stable versions of iOS 17, iPadOS 17, and macOS Sonoma later in the fall.

Article Link: Latest iOS 17 Beta Adds Support for Bilingual Siri Queries Mixing English With Hindi and Other Indic Languages

 

[KRBM]

This technology’s going to be super useful to Indians who want to be surprised by “Africa” by Toto when asking whether it’s gonna rain.

 

[nostaws]

Can I mix other languages? Like English and Spanish - used on both sides of the border.

 

[contacos]

The F, why is this only available for such "unique" languages. I have been complaining about this for YEARS. My iPhone is set to German but when I receive messages in Spanish or English, it becomes just gibberish. It's been working with the keyword forever but somehow Apple never made Siri smart enough to do the same.

 

[Pankeborg]

No, this is not common among “India based” users, it’s common among Indians, no matter where they live.

 

[Populus]

I would be super cool to have this feature with more combination of languages, such as English and Spanish, or English and German.

 

[Alpha Centauri]

I'd have great use for this for English and German. Not mixing words in a sentence but quickly utilizing Siri for either.

 

[Wildkraut]

Many countries use multiple languages to communicate, this is nothing new. Apple is living in a cave. Google knows it better, it supports multilingual requests, text reading and message replies.

 

[Wildkraut]

The F, why is this only available for such "unique" languages. I have been complaining about this for YEARS. My iPhone is set to German but when I receive messages in Spanish or English, it becomes just gibberish. It's been working with the keyword forever but somehow Apple never made Siri smart enough to do the same.

Same here… my iPhone is set to English, but i communicate in English, German, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian. Apple’s multi-language support is catastrophic.

Eg. Siri can’t read in different languages. Apple navigation read german road names like a moron. The keyboard auto-correction and suggestions works only with two languages, and is not very reliable, too.


Apple is 10 years behind Google at this.

 

[MLVC]

Yeah so bring this to other languages. I can’t use English Siri on the Apple TV because it’s set in English but my account is Dutch. I can’t use Dutch Siri because it does not understand English titles, and those won’t get translated in the Netherlands.

I get messages in English, German, Dutch French and Italian. It only reads English of course as my phone is set to English.

Let’s just hope this will expand to more languages. Not everybody is monolingual Apple.

 

[VAR_123]

I am an Indian (Telugu) person. Thanks, Apple. 👍🙏

 

[Steven.Knight]

As many others, I’d like to use my iPhone with multiple languages, but I can’t. Since I live in Italy, I had to set it up in Italian, otherwise maps app would read Italian roads with English pronunciation, which is rubbish. Besides, I’ve got an Apple Music subscription and Siri just can’t understand what I’m saying, for it expects me to have a Super Mario’s style pronounce… and that’s ridiculous.. my pronunciation is more like Luigi’s!

 

[Alpha Centauri]

Eg. Siri can’t read in different languages. Apple navigation read german road names like a moron. The keyboard auto-correction and suggestions works only with two languages, and is not very reliable, too.

Unfortunately not just Siri. Native (not CarPlay) Mercedes (MBUX) also can’t manage. I’d love to run all in English but it ***** itself with German street names, becomes useless really.

 

[contacos]

Same here… my iPhone is set to English, but i communicate in English, German, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian. Apple’s multi-language support is catastrophic.

Eg. Siri can’t read in different languages. Apple navigation read german road names like a moron. The keyboard auto-correction and suggestions works only with two languages, and is not very reliable, too.


Apple is 10 years behind Google at this.

They don’t even have to reinvent the wheel and could implement an easy system check. Something as basic as

If OS finds DE in communication with X
do Siri reply for X in DE
else
do EN

 

[racingbull]

Same here… my iPhone is set to English, but i communicate in English, German, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian. Apple’s multi-language support is catastrophic.

Eg. Siri can’t read in different languages. Apple navigation read german road names like a moron. The keyboard auto-correction and suggestions works only with two languages, and is not very reliable, too.


Apple is 10 years behind Google at this.

🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼

Fully agreed!!

 

[Pankeborg]

It’s obviously not that they are not aware of this, it’s that it didn’t have the highest priority.

 

[Pankeborg]

That’s great for you, but why would you want to talk to siri in different languages?

Same here… my iPhone is set to English, but i communicate in English, German, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian. Apple’s multi-language support is catastrophic.

Eg. Siri can’t read in different languages. Apple navigation read german road names like a moron. The keyboard auto-correction and suggestions works only with two languages, and is not very reliable, too.


Apple is 10 years behind Google at this.

 

[oldwatery]

How about making Siri work in plain English? Typical Apple, add features before getting the basics right. Siri is a mess😖

 

[Kar98]

I'd have great use for this for English and German. Not mixing words in a sentence but quickly utilizing Siri for either.

Works great with ChatGPT, like voellig nahtlos und du barely notices.
Wonder when Siri and Co will implement that tech.

 

[sza]

This feature has low priority than adding new emojis.

 

[antiprotest]

We need this for every combination of languages. Almost every multi-lingual person mix languages.

Maybe they're working on it and this will come eventually.

 

[Wildkraut]

That’s great for you, but why would you want to talk to siri in different languages?

Because i have different communication partners. When i’m e.g driving, I want to be able to verbally reply to a text message to somebody who wrote in Italian, instead of replying with an awkward englified italian diarrhea message, and not scare people to death by making they think I’m just having a stroke.

 

[bniu]

This is probably the first step to eventually fully supporting multi-lingual users and households. I’m also in a bilingual household where my spouse and I have different native languages and having Siri work in both languages side by side would be awesome.

 

[trimblet]

The F, why is this only available for such "unique" languages.

From Wikipedia:
English: 1,452m speakers
Hindi: 615m speakers
Spanish: 595m speakers
German: 180m speakers
Punjabi: 113m+ speakers
Marathi: 95m speakers
Telegu: 92m speakers
Kannada: 59m speakers

Yes, very "unique" languages. Also, some of these languages are very related, akin to the Romance languages (Italian, French, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish).

 

[trimblet]

According to TechCrunch, users will be able to ask queries to Siri by mixing English and Hindi, starting with select Indic languages. Users can mix English with Telegu, Punjabi, Kannada, or Marathi.

Uhh, TechCrunch didn't get this wrong, but Hindi is a different (additional) language than Telegu, Punjabi, Kannada, and Marathi. The title and text should be updated.