The New Siri AI Is Great if You Do These Things First

The new Siri AI can do a trick Apple never advertised

It's not something I've heard mentioned in any Apple presentation or demonstration

and it might just be the best reason to use it. Because in my early testing, I have found I'm spending less time looking at my phone

I press a quick button to ask Siri all sorts of things, and I don't need to open apps or poke around with messy Google search results anymore

to get real life tasks done or keep track of where I need to go next

or get answers to a question. I'm glad we are getting along, but I'm here to be your assistant

For me, this is the first time the personal assistant is acting

like my personal assistant because it is aware of context of where I am and what I'm looking at

and everything that's going on in my messages. I'm not trying to overhype this

I know not everything is perfect, but I just honestly feel a little mentally healthier now

because it's pulling me away from my screen addiction because I could just make Siri poke through my phone for me

And yeah, I got a screen addiction. I'll admit it. I get lost in social media and I open up my phone

and I forget why I opened up my phone. After 20 years of tech reporting

I guess you can call it an occupational hazard. But here is the twist

And it's the reason I'm making this video. You see, I realized to get the most out of this new AI Siri

you do need to have certain things already set up on your iPhone

The habits you might have made over the years to be using different apps

well, expect to adjust things a bit. I am going to walk you through what you should do now to get the best Siri experience

And this is good to know, even if you're not on the beta like me

and you're waiting until Apple releases it in the normal iOS 27 update

For starters, I need you to make sure that your side button is programmed to be a Siri shortcut

So go to settings then accessibility and then scroll to side button You going to make sure that press and hold to speak is set to Siri because this is the key to not having the need to look at your screen to get answers You have to unlock your phone

usually to get Siri to give you answers. Maybe for you, this means having Face ID activated. So

you do a little this, you get a quick unlock. I have mine set up to unlock when my Apple Watch

is near. Now in settings, go to Face ID and passcode, scroll all the way down to have it

unlock with nearby devices. You're going to toggle on Apple Watch if you have an Apple Watch

This means I just have a smoother experience getting Siri to work right away when I press

that button. Now, okay, let's get into the apps. I need you to actually use your Apple Calendar app

and not a third-party program. If you are using Google Calendar or you have shared calendars with

other friends using Google, that's still okay. You can sync those to show up in your Apple Calendar

Just click the little calendar looking icon on the bottom right and add a calendar

From what I've experienced so far, Siri only sees what is in my Apple calendar

Maybe third party apps can add that ability later, but you just need to get in the habit

of adding everything to your main Apple calendar. No matter if it's doctor's appointments or kid drop-offs, the more you add, the better

Siri gets at helping you navigate the day. Now, I love a paper calendar

This is mine. I'm not giving up my planner because I do retain information better when I write it down

But once I put things into my Apple calendar, that's when the new Siri became a game changer

What meetings do I have today? You have two upcoming meetings today. Shoot OMT is from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m

Take the shoot off my list. Are you sure you want to delete shoot OMT today at 4 p.m. in calendar

Yep. But it's okay if you're not great about putting everything in your calendar

Watch this. I have a dentist appointment coming up, but I didn't put it in my calendar

When's my dentist appointment? This Thursday August 6th 2026 at 9 a It got the info right and it gets all the info from a text message that the dentist sent me to confirm my appointment A few days ago I was getting a bunch of group text messages about a birthday party

but I didn't want to hunt through all of my messages. So I just asked Siri, what was that group text about the birthday party

Something at Six Flags? The group text Haley's B-Day group chat was about celebrating Haley's birthday at Six Flags

There you go. And I could just tap right into it. You can also be lazy and ask Siri to add anything you want from a text into your calendar and even ask to add the time it takes to drive there, which I did successfully

In every question, it'll also just pull up a link right to the answer or to the map or to the chat you're asking about so you can check the source yourself

It works best when I'm going through iMessage. If your family or friends are using another app to chat like WhatsApp or Signal, it can't see into those conversations, at least right now

The workaround there is to perhaps take any good bits of information from those other chats and copy and paste them into your notes app

Like if there's something you don't want to forget, because Siri can also read into your notes

The next thing you need to do, if you haven't already, you need to get all your email accounts feeding into your main iPhone mail app

If you are managing a family that has kids and they have multiple sign-up deadlines and tournament dates and camp locations

I need you to know this is the best thing that will ever happen to you

It's bad enough when you have your own busy schedule, but keeping up with where my kids need to be and when the money is due for different activities, it's just too much sometimes

Let me show you. When's the Taekwondo belt test? The next Taekwondo color belt test is scheduled for Thursday, August 6th

When do I have to pay to renew our Taekwondo classes? Your annual Taekwondo membership is due to be renewed in about 30 days

Set a reminder to do that tonight. I set a reminder to renew your Taekwondo membership for tonight at 7 p The kids want to go to Legoland but I don want to pay full price Are there any emails about Legoland tickets in my inbox I found several emails about Legoland tickets in your inbox

Grab $49 open dated tickets to Legoland while you can. In all those examples, I got the answers I

needed without having to comb through my messages. I hope that didn't bore you because I'm loving it

As a working parent, I am trying to juggle all of my appointments and places to be, which is

different every single day. But my workplace, my employer will not let my work email sync into

the iPhone email app. I can't do these Siri tricks with my work email questions. So if your work also

has limitations, be prepared that not everything might work with Siri. Also, another thing to check

make sure you're using the Apple Maps app for everything. I'm sorry, but you should just stop

using Google Maps. It's not as good anymore as Apple. There was a time Google was better

But if you're on the iPhone, Apple Maps is just a cleaner experience

The directions are more clear and you get better advanced warnings. But the new Siri AI takes it up a notch

It helps you stay hands-free in the car with more conversational planning

You can give multi-step navigation commands or ask it to adjust settings or find something along your route

Now, you're going to want to turn on Siri suggestions for Maps if you don't already have it on

Go to settings, then Siri, then apps, or maybe for you it says app access, and you're going to toggle this on

When you open up Maps, you might get some automatic suggestions on where to go based on what's in your calendar

I need directions to pick up Olivia. Which violin class are you picking Olivia up from

Isn't it nice when things just work? It's so nice, right? And these tips I'm giving you, they might get more involved as the new Siri is released

And Apple might come out with a better HomePod speaker and that might tap into the smarter Siri

And so I'm sure there's more things to adjust as we progress. This is one more thing, the show on all things Apple

I'm Bridget Carey. I make videos like this every week. So subscribe if you want this transition to the new iOS 27 to get a little easier