Apple today announced a major overhaul of its Apple Intelligence platform, revealing a new architecture built on foundation models developed in collaboration with Google using the technologies behind the Gemini family.
The new architecture centers on Apple Foundation Models co-developed with Google, which Apple says are adapted to run both on-device and on servers through its existing Private Cloud Compute infrastructure. Apple described the collaboration as a "deep" one that it says unlocks what it called a "huge upgrade" for Apple Intelligence, bringing state-of-the-art understanding and reasoning capabilities as well as multimodal support including image understanding and generation.
The upgraded models support new capabilities use cases, including realistic image creation, advanced photo editing, and visual question answering. Certain devices will receive a higher-power version of the model with additional capabilities including speech generation, improved dictation accuracy, and stronger natural language understanding, though Apple did not specify which devices qualify.
A new system orchestrator sits at the center of the revised architecture, coordinating Apple Intelligence features securely across Apple's platforms. Apple says the orchestrator allows the system to tailor its responses based on the active app and the user's current task, enabling what the company described as truly system-wide intelligence.
Apple used the announcement to frame its approach as a contrast to competitors it characterized as "racing forward" without regard for users. The company reiterated that Apple Intelligence relies on on-device processing and Private Cloud Compute, with a promise that user data is only used to execute the immediate request and is not accessible to Apple or third parties. Apple added that outside experts can verify those privacy guarantees "at any time."
