iOS 27: Release Date and Every New Feature

Apple confirmed iOS 27 will arrive Monday, September 14 — five days after the September 9 keynote that detailed it, and before any of the new iPhone hardware announced there actually ships. It's compatible with the same iPhones as iOS 26 — the iPhone 11 and later — though several of the headline features are restricted to newer hardware.

Siri AI Is the Headline Feature

The biggest change across the entire update is a rebuilt Siri. It adds text input, conversation history, follow-up questions, and much broader access to personal context — what's on your screen, in your apps, and in past conversations. A dedicated Siri mode in the Camera app brings Visual Intelligence to anything the camera sees, and users can now include screenshots or captured images directly as context for a Siri query. The most capable version of Siri AI is limited to the iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, and iPhone 16 or later; custom Siri voices go further still, restricted to the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone Air.

Photos and Image Playground

Photos adds Extend, which uses Apple Intelligence to generate content beyond a photo's original boundaries, and Spatial Reframe, for changing a shot's apparent perspective after the fact. Image Playground gains new generation styles, including support for photorealistic images for the first time — though Apple caps daily usage on resource-heavy generation features, with higher limits reserved for iCloud+ subscribers.

Apple Intelligence Has Real Limits

Worth knowing before you plan around any of this: daily usage caps apply to the more resource-intensive generative features, and the 50GB iCloud+ tier is explicitly excluded from the higher usage allowance available to other paid tiers. In the Home app, Apple Intelligence-powered camera features specifically require at least a 2TB iCloud+ plan.

iPhone Handoff: One Number, Two Phones

A new feature called iPhone Handoff lets you switch between two iPhones while keeping the same phone number active on both — useful for anyone who splits time between a personal and work device, or wants to try a new iPhone without losing calls and texts on the old one mid-transition.

Design and Everyday Changes

Beyond the AI-driven features, iOS 27 continues refining last year's Liquid Glass visual language, adds stronger parental controls, and brings general speed and stability improvements — Apple has described this cycle as more about polish than adding as many new surface-level features as recent years.

Feature details above are drawn from Apple's own announcement and release notes. Real-world performance of Apple Intelligence and Siri AI features will depend on the specific device and iCloud+ tier in use.