Alibaba's Qwen is coming to Siri and other Apple Intelligence tools in China
Alibaba and Apple say Qwen will power parts of Apple Intelligence for users in China, with beta testing from November 4 and a December launch.
The short version
- Announced October 31: Qwen joins Apple Intelligence for users in China
- It appears in three places: Siri, Writing Tools and Visual Intelligence
- Beta testing starts November 4; the full launch comes with iOS 27.3 in December
- The feature is opt-in, and Alibaba says it will not train its models on user requests
- Qwen only receives a question, document or photo after the user agrees
Why it matters
A model built by a Chinese tech giant will sit inside the assistant that many iPhone owners in China already use, with no separate app to install. That is distribution most AI products cannot buy. It also sets a visible bar for what other apps get compared against.
What was announced
As leiphone.com reported, Alibaba and Apple reached a partnership on October 31 to build Qwen, Alibaba's AI model family, into Apple Intelligence. Chinese users will be able to call on its text and image understanding and its content generation from inside the iPhone's own tools.
Testing begins November 4 in the latest iOS developer beta. The general release for Chinese users is set for December, when iOS 27.3 ships.
Three places Qwen will show up
- Siri: it can pass questions to Qwen and show the answer directly. Users can also ask Qwen about documents and photos they choose.
- Writing Tools: a feature called Compose with Qwen generates content on any topic, and can also generate images.
- Visual Intelligence: users can pick "Ask Qwen" to identify what the camera sees. It opens from Camera Control, the Action button or Control Center.
Privacy and who gets it
The integration is switched on by the user. Once enabled, people sign in with Apple or with their Qwen app account. Nothing goes to Qwen until the user approves it.
Alibaba says requests and generated replies will not be used to train its models. The feature is for people who bought an Apple Intelligence-capable iPhone in China, or whose device location and Apple account region are both set to China.
What the announcement leaves open
The source does not say whether Qwen runs on the phone or on Alibaba's servers, or which Qwen model is used. It also does not mention pricing or any rollout outside China.
Qwen is known for open-weight releases, meaning the model files can be downloaded. Nothing here says those files are on the phone, so being integrated does not make this an open model.
What to watch
- Whether Qwen runs on the device or on a server, and which Qwen model it uses
- How the beta performs in real use before the December iOS 27.3 launch
- Whether any rollout outside China is planned
Try it
If you build or sell for iPhone users in China, check the developer beta from November 4 to see how your content and product names appear in Siri, Writing Tools and Visual Intelligence.
Sources and links
- Reportingleiphone.com: the article we sourced
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Listen to the daily showsFirst reported by leiphone.com · Read the original. Written by the SI Agent News Desk from the reporting above.Written with AI from the source above. Every number is checked against the source. Spot a mistake? Corrections.