Apple and Google’s relationship has always been a little absurd. Google pays Apple upwards of $20 billion a year to stay the default search engine in Safari, which means iPhone users are basically the world’s most profitable Google customers.
Now Apple is reportedly gearing up to ship a new Siri feature that could chip away at that same business, and it might run on Google’s own AI.
Apple is reportedly building something it calls World Knowledge Answers, which is a very Apple way of saying “we rebuilt Siri to do what ChatGPT already does.”
You’ll be able to ask Siri general questions and get back summaries with text, photos, videos, and local recommendations.
It’s the kind of functionality people have been asking for since 2011, when Siri first launched and immediately became a punchline.
Apple is testing Google’s Gemini AI as one of the core models behind this new answer engine. That means Google could end up powering an experience that makes people less likely to visit Google Search in the first place.
Imagine paying tens of billions to be the default search on iPhones, only to have Siri step in and intercept the query before it ever reaches Google.com. That’s some top-tier corporate comedy.
Apple isn’t betting everything on Google, though. It’s also building its own models for on-device tasks like handling email and messages, plus testing alternatives from Anthropic.
Apple still wants to make privacy its differentiator. So the most personal stuff won’t be farmed out to anyone else’s cloud.
If Apple pulls this off, Siri could finally become useful in a way it never has before. Instead of fumbling commands and sending you to ChatGPT, it could actually answer your questions.
That’s a fundamental challenge to Google’s grip on search, one that’s arriving on the iPhone of all places.
Apple loves to play the long game. Currently, the board is set up so that Google continues to pay Apple for traffic while also supplying the AI that may reduce it.
The iPhone has always been the most valuable piece of real estate on the internet, and it looks like Apple is finally ready to start developing it for itself.
Is Apple finally in a position to take on Google in search, or is this just hype? Share your opinion in the comments.
