Apple Intelligence is about to give Siri a whole host of new potential and a fresh new look, but it could even bring the Apple assistant a fresh new name – if you’d like it to.
As reported by MacRumors, the new Vocal Shortcuts accessibility feature, available in the iOS 18 beta, lets you wake Siri with whatever name you fancy.
Once your custom phrase is set, you can trigger Siri with something like “Hey Computer”, “What’s up, Siri”, or anything you can possibly imagine. I’d usually advise you to “keep it clean” but since you can type to Siri now, that’s less of a consideration for some, I’m sure.
How to change Siri’s ‘name’
If you’re running the beta, you can try it for yourself. Just head into Settings, then Accessibility, then Vocal Shortcuts.
Pick ‘Set Up Vocal Shortcuts’, then ‘Siri’, and choose a name of your choosing before saying it a few times to confirm.
MacRumors confirms that you’ll need to pause a little after summoning Siri via an alternative command, however. So, naming my Siri after my dear iMore colleague, “Siri, set a timer for 10 minutes” would become, for example, “Daryl” followed by a pause, then the request.
While it’s clearly an accessibility feature first and foremost, it’s worth remembering many Apple features have started out that way, including iPad cursor support – and then ended up being a pretty big deal, too.
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