Apple Intelligence Gets Major Upgrade at WWDC 2025: Live Translation, Visual Intelligence, Genmoji & More

At the WWDC 2025 keynote, Apple placed artificial intelligence—sorry, Apple Intelligence—front and center. While we still didn't see the long-promised next-gen Siri, Apple unveiled a wave of AI-powered features aimed at making your iPhone, iPad, and even Apple Watch smarter and more intuitive than ever.

Live Translation Comes to Messages, FaceTime & Phone

Apple is finally joining the real-time translation game with Live Translation, integrated into Messages, FaceTime, and the Phone app. On FaceTime, you’ll still hear the original voice, but live translated captions will be overlaid. Phone calls will use translated voice responses instead. Apple says the feature works entirely on-device to protect user privacy.

Genmoji: Custom Emojis with a Personal Touch

With Genmoji, users can create their own emojis by blending different emoji styles and adding personalized descriptors. You can even fine-tune Genmoji based on your friends’ latest hairstyles or looks—bringing emoji creation to a whole new level.

Visual Intelligence + ChatGPT = Smarter Screens

A major leap forward is Visual Intelligence, which can analyze whatever is on your screen and respond to questions via ChatGPT integration. See an event on your screen? Visual Intelligence will suggest adding it to your calendar, pulling in the date, time, and location.

You can access this by simply taking a screenshot—alongside the usual save/share options, there’s now a button to “Explore with Visual Intelligence.”

Smarter Shortcuts & Productivity Tools

Shortcuts now use Apple Intelligence to enable powerful workflows. For instance, students can compare an audio transcript of a lecture with their handwritten notes and get highlights of what they missed.

ChatGPT is built into the background if needed, but Apple’s own models are the default.

Other upgrades include:

Reminders: Automatically detects and categorizes tasks from emails or webpages.

Apple Wallet: Summarizes order tracking info from merchant emails.

Messages: Suggests creating polls and allows users to add them seamlessly into chats.

Apple Watch Gets Motivational AI Workout Buddy

Apple Watch users with Bluetooth headphones can now meet Workout Buddy, powered by Apple Intelligence. It offers personalized workout insights based on fitness data—like heart rate, pace, and milestones—with motivational speech generated from Fitness+ trainers’ voices.

Available first in English, Workout Buddy supports:

Indoor/Outdoor Running

Indoor/Outdoor Walking

Outdoor Cycling

HIIT

Functional & Traditional Strength Training