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Listen to Siri's More Natural Voice in iOS 11

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Siri gets smarter in every new version of iOS, and iOS 11 is no exception. This year, Siri has been improved with advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence, giving the personal assistant a much more natural, expressive voice.

As you'll hear in the video, Siri sounds more human, adopting better pronunciation and different inflection depending on what's being said. There are also a lot of other improvements, which are covered in our Siri video and in the post below.


In iOS 11, Siri uses on-device learning across all of your devices to get a more complete picture of your interests, preferences, and routines. Because Siri now syncs across multiple devices, Siri learns more about you and your interactions with Siri are always the same regardless of whether you're using an iPhone, iPad, or Mac.

Siri can now do things like suggest a topic you might like in Apple News based on Safari browsing habits, or suggest a Calendar reminder for an appointment you've booked in Safari. Siri might also make QuickType word suggestions based on things you've recently viewed -- names of movies or places, for example.

Siri has built in translation capabilities in iOS 11 and can translate English to Chinese, French, German, Italian, and Spanish, plus with music enhancements implemented for HomePod, Siri can play music you like and offer up answers to music-related queries like "What song is this?" or "Who's the drummer in this band?" when you're listening to music.

You can even type to Siri using a new "Type to Siri" Accessibility option. This makes it easier to communicate with Siri when speaking isn't an option.

For more on Siri and the rest of the new features coming in iOS 11, make sure to check out our iOS 11 roundup. Stay tuned to MacRumors, because we have more videos coming on iOS 11, watchOS 4, and macOS High Sierra.

Article Link: Listen to Siri's More Natural Voice in iOS 11
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2017/06/14/siri-voice-and-new-features-ios-11/
I tested this for the first time last night after installing iOS 11 on my 10.5" iPad Pro. I asked Siri to tell me a joke in iOS 10 on my iPhone, and then in iOS 11 on the iPad. I'm not sure if it's because of the query being a joke, but I feel like the new Siri lacks the personality and warmth of the old Siri. The new one just sounded more robotic to me. I need to test it some more, as I was mainly interesting in playing around with multitasking and the Apple Pencil which I haven't used much before now, but so far I don't really care much for the new voice. Anyone else feel the same?
 
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Last time Apple tried to blame microphone technology. I used my Mac with an expensive microphone still Siri sucks! So this time they they kinda admitted that Siri is just sucks and needs to keep up with Google? Well played Apple!
 
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macduke said:
I tested this for the first time last night after installing iOS 11 on my 10.5" iPad Pro. I asked Siri to tell me a joke in iOS 10 on my iPhone, and then in iOS 11 on the iPad. I'm not sure if it's because of the query being a joke, but I feel like the new Siri lacks the personality and warmth of the old Siri. The new one just sounded more robotic to me. I need to test it some more, as I was mainly interesting in playing around with multitasking and the Apple Pencil which I haven't used much before now, but so far I don't really care much for the new voice. Anyone else feel the same?
Click to expand...

I switched to the male voice (US). Don’t really like the new female voice. I do like the male one though, sounds more natural.
 
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Hopefully when you ask Siri to make an appointment with someone (or a business) on your contact list, Siri will now add their location to the Calendar event. Incredibly it has never done this in the past.
 
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MLVC said:
I switched to the male voice (US). Don’t really like the new female voice. I do like the male one though, sounds more natural.
Click to expand...
I did like the male voice more in this short video clip. Maybe I'll try it when I get home. It just feels so weird to have Siri sound like a guy, though.
 
Still waiting on Siri Custom Scripts.

Let us record a command stored on device that is executed prior to Siri going out to the web.

Then allow us to record Macros to the scripts, actual tap progressions such as launching an app and doing actions.

For example, you have a TV or Reciever app.

Record Hey Siri Mute TV voice command. Then record launching app and tapping mute control. Then we could have Siri mute the TV.

Likewise other items could be recorded and executed via commands. Right now all we can do is launch an app which then still requires us to pull out or interact with the device.
 
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JustSomeInfo said:
The Australian female voice is the way to go. Hopefully they make it even better.
Click to expand...

I tried the British English voice for awhile just for fun and found that it mangles pronunciations of American English place names and didn't seem to understand my American English queries as well either. It turns out Apple localized these Siri voices for a good reason.
 
Is her brain any better? In 10 and earlier, she can't even reliably dial businesses in your contact list, returns useless web search results, and has terrible recognition of certain words (try telling Siri to send a text message with the question, 'Is your phone on mute' for example).
 
macduke said:
I did like the male voice more in this short video clip. Maybe I'll try it when I get home. It just feels so weird to have Siri sound like a guy, though.
Click to expand...

Yeah it takes some getting used to but the new female Siri also takes some getting used to. She just talks so fast at times while the male seems to be a bit more relaxed haha
 
Is it me or is it only the US Female voice which has changed? My partners iOS 10 British Female/Male and US Male sound exactly the same as mine on iOS 11.
 
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Every time I see Siri has changed the voice to become more natural I think of the old Eddie Murphy skit about his car talking. Warning Explicit!

 
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MLVC said:
Yeah it takes some getting used to but the new female Siri also takes some getting used to. She just talks so fast at times while the male seems to be a bit more relaxed haha
Click to expand...
That's really strange because when I was comparing the old and new last night, the old one seemed to be talking a lot faster. I wonder if I have a weird setting I need to change in accessibility or something.
 
I never had any complaints about the way Siri sounds or the services "she" theoretically should be able to provide. My complaint is that she's gotten so much worse at hearing and processing my commands and inquiries properly.

It's now embarrassing to use Siri. As I posted in another part of the forum, I recently asked Siri "Who wrote Oh Lord It's Hard to be Humble". Siri kept getting my query wrong and most humorously and inexplicably pulled up search results about Puerto Rico. This happened when I was with extended family, so it was a little embarrassing.

I'm not able to watch the video at the moment. I do hope there's some indication that the updates will make Siri less hard of hearing and less addled.
 
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