WWDC 2026: A New Siri and Tim Cook’s Last Keynote as CEO

Apple opens its 37th Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday, 8 June, with a keynote at 10am Pacific Time. For viewers in Kenya, that is 8pm EAT. The conference runs to 12 June and streams free on Apple.com, the Apple TV app, YouTube and the Apple Developer app. WWDC is a software show, so do not expect a wall of new gadgets. This year it carries unusual weight for two reasons. The first is the long-promised Siri overhaul. The second is that this is very likely the last WWDC keynote Tim Cook delivers as chief executive.

Apple confirmed in April that Cook hands the CEO role to John Ternus, its hardware engineering chief, on 1 September. So the man who will run Apple through its AI rebuild is already named, and WWDC is the stage where that rebuild has to start showing results.

Start with Siri, because that is the headline. Apple first previewed a smarter, more personal Siri at WWDC 2024, then delayed it. Reporting from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman says iOS 27 turns Siri into something closer to a chatbot. Expect a dedicated Siri app, saved chat history, and an iMessage-style conversation view. Siri is also tipped to move into the Dynamic Island, where a swipe brings up a “Search or Ask” prompt, and it may even replace Spotlight as the main way you search your phone.

What powers it matters most. As we already explained when Apple’s genai.apple.com domain surfaced ahead of the show, the rebuilt Siri runs partly on Google. Apple and Google announced a partnership in January 2026 under which a custom 1.2 trillion-parameter version of Google’s Gemini model helps power Apple’s Foundation Models. Bloomberg put the deal at roughly $1 billion a year, about KES 129 billion at today’s rate, though neither company has confirmed the figure. Private tasks stay on your device. The heavy reasoning runs on Apple’s own Private Cloud Compute servers, not Google’s.

There is a quieter shift too. Gurman reports iOS 27, iPadOS 27 and macOS 27 may let you choose which AI model powers Apple Intelligence features such as Writing Tools and Image Playground, with the option to lean on ChatGPT or Anthropic’s Claude. For a company known for its walled garden, letting users pick a rival’s model is a real change.

Beyond Siri, temper expectations. Gurman describes iOS 27 as a “Snow Leopard” release, named after the 2009 Mac update that fixed bugs rather than adding features. The focus is stability, removing old code, and tuning the Liquid Glass look that drew readability complaints last year. Expect a transparency slider, keyboard improvements, Apple Maps over satellite, and a new “Organize Tabs” feature in Safari that groups tabs automatically. macOS 27 is tipped for a slight redesign to improve contrast.

The rest of the ecosystem gets lighter touches. watchOS 27 is expected to add new watch faces, including a Modular Ultra-style design, plus refined heart-rate tracking. Apple’s bigger health bet, an AI coach known internally as Project Mulberry, has reportedly been scaled back and folded into the Health app rather than launched on its own. And because this is a developer conference first, watch the Platforms State of the Union for new tools. Apple is expected to widen access to its on-device Foundation Models framework, which lets developers build AI features into their own apps, alongside the usual Xcode and SDK updates.

Hardware is the wildcard. An M5-series Mac Studio and Mac mini are overdue, but a global memory shortage may push them later in the year, with some reports pointing to the autumn. Apple’s long-rumoured smart home hub, sometimes called HomePad, with a 7-inch screen, an A18 chip and a new homeOS platform, is tied to the new Siri and may only be teased, not sold.

The leadership angle is not a footnote. Ternus is an engineer who has run hardware for the iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch and Vision Pro, and he is a familiar keynote presenter, having unveiled the iPhone Air last year. He inherits one clear problem above all others, which is fixing Apple’s AI. That is why a Siri demo this June reads as more than a feature update. It is the first public test of the strategy the next chief executive has to deliver.

For iPhone owners, the practical points are simple. iOS 27 is rumoured to support the iPhone 12 and newer, dropping the iPhone 11. The catch is that Apple Intelligence, and so most of the new Siri smarts, still needs an iPhone 15 Pro, 15 Pro Max, or any iPhone 16 or later. A chip requirement, not a new cable, decides whether you get the headline feature. The full public release of iOS 27 is expected in September, alongside the iPhone 18.

So watch for two things on Monday. First, whether Apple gives the new Siri a firm release date and says it works on the phone already in your pocket. Second, how confidently Cook and Ternus present the AI plan together, because the person who has to make it work takes over ten weeks later. That is the real measure of WWDC 2026.