Apple wants to move Siri toward agent-style work, and Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman wrote in the Power On newsletter on November 8 that Gurman believes the company “could make Siri more like an agent as early as next year”. Gurman contrasted Siri in iOS 27.3, which carries out actions when a user gives a command, with ChatGPT’s Dots, Meta’s Muse and Elon Musk’s Grok, which Gurman said can be handed an ongoing responsibility and continue working between conversations.
The same newsletter reported that Apple changed how it builds its 2027 operating systems. In the first development milestone for iOS 28, iPadOS 28 and macOS 28, engineers got six weeks of coding, exploration and feature development and two weeks of convergence, instead of the usual four and four, according to Bloomberg. By our arithmetic, that is 50% more coding time and half the convergence time in that stage.
Business Pill · AI Agents Explained
An evergreen Business Engineer explainer on AI agents. It teaches the general idea only and does not discuss Siri.
The key insight: Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported on November 8 that Apple wants to make Siri more agent-like, possibly as early as next year in Gurman’s view, contrasting Siri’s request-based actions with ChatGPT Dots, Meta Muse and Grok, which Gurman said keep working between conversations. Apple also gave engineers six weeks of coding instead of four in the first iOS 28 milestone, which by our arithmetic is 50% more coding time in that stage.
Gurman wrote that today’s Siri AI “can properly answer questions, write emails and text messages, set reminders, pull information from the open web, serve up news and take basic actions inside apps”. Gurman described its biggest development this year as the ability to draw context from what is on a user’s display and from private information on Apple devices, such as emails and text messages.
The iOS 27.3 beta adds precise control over Apple’s own apps, Gurman reported, with examples including organising Safari tabs, sorting Files folders, unsending an iMessage and multistep Photos edits. Gurman wrote that support for Apple’s apps “could come as early as December” and that third-party app support probably won’t arrive until the spring. Our earlier piece reported Apple opening Siri AI to any app.
Weeks in the first (M1) development milestone of Apple’s operating systems: usually four weeks of coding and four of convergence; for iOS 28, iPadOS 28 and macOS 28, six weeks of coding, exploration and feature development and two of convergence, as reported by Bloomberg (Power On, 8 Nov 2026). +50% coding time and halved convergence: our arithmetic.
Mark Gurman, who writes the Power On newsletter for Bloomberg, posted on 8 November that Apple eyes an autonomous, agentic Siri as early as next year to rival ChatGPT Dots, Meta Muse and Grok. The newsletter frames that timing as Gurman’s own belief based on the reporting, and Apple has not announced it.
Gurman also posted that Apple is changing how it develops iOS 28, iPadOS 28 and macOS 28, giving engineers more time to explore and build new features before locking them in. The newsletter puts the change at six weeks of coding and two of convergence in the first milestone, instead of four and four.
Apple is exploring turning Siri into a background AI agent similar to OpenAI’s ChatGPT Dots as part of an iOS 28 shake-up, according to Bloomberg. Apple is still delivering the Siri overhaul it promised years ago. Now it is already exploring the architecture that could make that version look obsolete.
Choblin29 relayed the Bloomberg report and added a view that Apple is exploring an architecture that could make its promised Siri overhaul look obsolete. That framing is the poster’s own; the newsletter says Apple wants to go in the agent direction and that the in-app actions promised in 2024 are still arriving in iOS 27.3.
Apple finally stepping up to compete in AI with a personal AI agent that rivals Meta Muse, grok bot etc. few thoughts:
– the new feature would allow 3rd-party apps to integrate siri. which means siri can perform actions, pull context through every app on your phone. that’s pretty sick.
– despite being behind in AI, apple has a huge advantage: 3.5 billion devices people love and use everyday
– but at the same time siri right now sucks, is incapable of doing even 30% of the things frontier LLMs can do. it can’t even use a computer.
– compare this to muse, dots or grok bot that can work autonomously 24/7, self-improving the more you use it AND have access to their own computer. they’re miles ahead.
imo apple has to balance delivering quickly (& aggressively) on AI without causing a major security breach. their whole thing is trust and privacy.
An X user posting as cryptopunk7213 (Ejaaz) shared a personal take on Gurman’s report at 17:07 UTC on 8 November. The post describes the reported feature as letting third-party apps integrate with Siri so it can act across apps, and argues that Apple’s installed base of devices is an advantage; that argument and the 3.5 billion devices figure are the poster’s, not Bloomberg’s.
What Dots, Muse and Grok Do That Siri Doesn’t
Gurman wrote that these features are “nothing close to what you can do with something like ChatGPT’s Dots, Meta’s Muse and Elon Musk’s Grok”. Gurman listed what those agents do: they “can remember projects and preferences over time, monitor connected sources for changes, proactively surface information, and decide when to pause and resume work”.
In Gurman’s summary, Siri “can now execute more complicated requests and integrate more deeply with third-party software”, while Dots, Muse and Grok “can keep track of goals, determine what needs to happen next and continue pursuing objectives without the user initiating every individual step”. Apple ultimately wants to go in that direction, Gurman wrote, citing people Gurman spoke to.
Apple CEO John Ternus said on the company’s earnings call, as quoted by Bloomberg, that Siri is “primarily request-based today” but “built on a modern orchestrator-driven architecture that gives us real room to expand its capabilities over time”. Ternus added that Apple wants agentic features done “in a way that protects security and privacy”. Our earlier piece covered Ternus pressing Federighi on AI, including the separate gap Gurman flagged in computer use.
The One Agent-Like Feature Apple Has Shown
Gurman called a feature Apple showed at WWDC 2026 its “first truly agent-like iOS feature”: software that would analyse passwords saved to a user’s Apple account, identify weak or compromised credentials, and go from website to website changing them. The feature appeared early in the iOS 27 beta cycle before quietly disappearing, and Apple’s iOS marketing site still says it will arrive in the future, Gurman reported.
How Apple Changed the iOS 28 Process
Apple traditionally splits each year’s operating-system work into three milestones, M1, M2 and M3, each running eight weeks of four weeks of coding and four weeks of convergence, Gurman reported. For M1 of this cycle, covering Bell (iOS 28 and iPadOS 28) and Poppy (macOS 28), engineers got six weeks of coding, exploration and feature development and two weeks of convergence, according to the newsletter.
Employees say they like the change, which creates more time to come up with ideas before locking them in, Gurman wrote. Development of the M2 milestone kicks off on Monday, and that is the period when Apple will start to finalise what it plans to include, according to the report.
As we read the newsletter, the gap Gurman describes is less about what Siri can do in a single request and more about whether it can hold a goal over time and act without being asked.
As we read the iOS 28 change, giving engineers six weeks to explore before converging is a process signal that Apple is making room for new features before it locks the 2027 releases in.
As we read Ternus’s quoted remarks, Apple frames agentic features around user awareness, security and privacy, which is the constraint Gurman sets against the speed of ChatGPT Dots, Muse and Grok.
Apple CEO John Ternus on the earnings call, as quoted by Bloomberg
“It’s primarily request-based today, but as we talked about at WWDC, it’s built on a modern orchestrator-driven architecture that gives us real room to expand its capabilities over time”
Three Implications
FOR IPHONE USERS Gurman reported that precise control of Apple’s own apps could come as early as December with iOS 27.3, and third-party app support probably not until the spring.
FOR RIVAL AGENT MAKERS Gurman listed what ChatGPT Dots, Meta Muse and Grok do that Siri does not: remember projects, monitor sources, surface information proactively and decide when to pause and resume work.
FOR THE DATES TO WATCH Development of the iOS 28 M2 milestone starts on Monday, the period when Apple will start to finalise what it plans to include, according to Bloomberg.
The essay says “The agentic surface — the harness — is becoming where value pools in the entire AI stack.”
As we read it, Gurman’s comparison is about that surface: Apple owns the devices and operating systems, while the agent layer users delegate goals to is being built by ChatGPT Dots, Meta Muse and Grok. The essay does not discuss Siri.
What Is Not Established
Apple has not announced an agentic Siri or a date for one. The “as early as next year” timing is Gurman’s own belief based on Gurman’s reporting, and the iOS 28 process change is reported from people Gurman spoke to, not from Apple. The December and spring timings for app support are Gurman’s reading of Apple’s beta language. The password feature has not shipped.
This Week In The AI Supercycle
The Great Convergence of Capital, Power, and Geopolitics
This week’s issue: for two years the AI build-out was priced as a supply story, and last week as a credit story. This week it was priced as a permission story, and the answer arrived as a cost, not a ban.
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reported that Apple wants to make Siri more agent-like, possibly as early as next year in Gurman’s view. Gurman contrasted Siri’s request-based actions with ChatGPT Dots, Meta Muse and Grok, which Gurman said track goals and keep working between conversations. Apple also gave engineers six weeks of coding instead of four in the first iOS 28 milestone, which by our arithmetic is 50% more coding time in that stage.
A note on sourcing. The Siri comparison, the Ternus quotes, the password feature, the iOS 27.3 timing and the iOS 28 milestone change are from Mark Gurman’s Power On newsletter published by Bloomberg on 8 November 2026, which we read in full. We first saw the story in X posts by @markgurman and @choblin29. The 50% figure is our arithmetic. We did not contact Apple.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
