Apple Intelligence will reach iPhone users in China in December, when iOS 27.3 ships a first set of features, with support for Alibaba's Qwen in Siri, Writing Tools and visual intelligence. Developers can test the features from November 4 in the latest iOS developer beta, and Apple says other platforms will follow once it has the necessary approvals.
Apple says its own generative models power Apple Intelligence, and it worked with Alibaba to add Qwen support to some Apple Intelligence experiences. Siri can call on Qwen for broad-knowledge requests and for questions about photos and documents such as PDFs and presentations. Users can reach Qwen directly in Siri, Writing Tools and visual intelligence, including for text and image understanding, and a Compose function in Writing Tools lets Qwen draft original text from scratch. Users reach it by signing in to a Qianwen (千问) account or with Sign in with Apple.
Apple lists these as the first features coming to supported iPhones in China:
- Live Translation for select languages in Messages, FaceTime and Phone, including face-to-face translation through supported AirPods
- Writing Tools for rewriting, proofreading and summarizing, plus Genmoji and the Clean Up tool in Photos
- Natural-language search and Memories movies in Photos
- Priority messages in Mail, email summaries and Smart Reply, along with notification summaries, Priority Notifications and Reduce Interruptions
- Audio transcription summaries in Notes, call transcript summaries, typing to Siri, and visual intelligence for learning about nearby objects and places through the iPhone camera
Supported iPhones are the iPhone 16 and later, iPhone Duo, iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max and iPhone Air, with Siri and the device set to the same language, English or Simplified Chinese. Apple lists the same iPhone models for Apple Intelligence in iOS 27, and it lists most of these features as supported since iOS 26. Visual intelligence runs on every Apple Intelligence-enabled iPhone, and Apple notes that some features may be limited to certain languages or regions. Live Translation through AirPods needs AirPods 5, AirPods 4 with active noise cancellation, AirPods Pro 2 or later, or AirPods Max 2, on current firmware and paired with an Apple Intelligence iPhone with the same language settings, per Apple.
| Milestone | Timing |
|---|---|
| Developer beta testing | Opens November 4 |
| Release on iPhone | December, with iOS 27.3 |
| Other platforms | After required approvals |
The China release also leaves things out. It does not include Siri AI or the other next-generation Apple Intelligence features announced at WWDC 2026. Apple lists Siri AI in beta, starting in English, French, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese and Spanish.
