What changed
Apple’s AI-powered 'Audio Intelligence' technology for the Apple Watch is now rolling out into beta testing, initially for developers in the iOS 27.3 update. The technology includes four opt-in AI features that allow Apple Watch Series 12 wearers to detect important sounds, identify songs, catch up on conversations, and take notes.
What this means in practice
The sound recognition feature helps deaf and hard-of-hearing users identify important sounds like sirens, alarms, or doorbells from their watch. The song recognition feature uses Apple’s Shazam app to detect music playing in the background and identify the song name and artist. The more controversial features, Live Rewind and Siri Recaps, allow users to review recent conversations. Live Rewind lets users double-press the digital crown to see a text snippet of the last 15 seconds of a conversation, which can be saved to the standalone Siri app. Siri Recaps creates high-level notes of conversations, summarizing key points without identifying speakers or saving raw audio. These features are designed to respect privacy by not recording conversations when using headphones or noise cancellation.
Limitations and availability
The features rely on Apple’s hardware, software, and services, including the S11 chip, built-in microphone, and Apple Intelligence models. Audio is processed on the iPhone using Private Cloud Compute and is encrypted when synced across devices. The features are currently in beta testing for developers and will later roll out to the public beta for broader testing before becoming publicly available. Users can opt to enable Siri Recaps manually or configure a schedule, and they can disable the feature at any time from the Control Center. The recaps are deleted after seven days if not saved, and the 15-second snippets from Live Rewind are deleted after 30 seconds if not saved.
