It sounds like Apple's Safari 18 will all be about AI

Google, Samsung and Microsoft have been shouting about AI so much it sometimes seems that every major new tool or design change is an excuse to throw this buzz term about. Now it seems Apple's going to join the party. 

According the latest rumours, Apple's testing a redesigned version of its web browser that will be named Safari 18. It's said to feature an AI-powered tool that Apple's calling Intelligent Search as well as some UI tweaks (for more UI design news, see the controversy around the YouTube redesign).

News of the testing was apparently leaked to AppleInsider, which is often on the ball on such things. It reports that Safari 18 is expected to launch later in the year alongside iOS 18 and macOS 15. It seems that Intelligent Search will be the headline AI-driven feature. The tool will identify topics and key phrases on a web page to summarise the contents. Apple's own large language model (LLM) will reportedly pick out phrases that give explanations or describe the structure of objects and repeated words and key sentences will be recognized as topics.

So far, so ChatGPT. The difference is that this will be on-device, which some Apple fans note should make it more secure. Meanwhile, other new tools reportedly coming to Safari 18 reportedly include a sophisticated-sounding adblocker-like tool called Web Eraser, which would allow users to remove elements on web pages, such as banner ads, images or whole page sections, with Safari remembering the changes and applying them in subsequent sessions too, with users to be given an option to revert restore the webpage to its original state.

Some say this sounds like it could be useful, but it would be even more wonderful if this could also detect and block AI-generated text. Alas, there's no suggestion that this is on the cards. The purported tool is also being criticised as hypocritical by some as it will see Apple allowing users to block ads on websites while it sells ads in Apple News.

It's also claimed that Safari 18 will have some UI tweaks, including a new menu pulling together a range of page controls. This will include the new tools mentioned above but also bring in controls already available but spread through the UI like zoom options, privacy controls, reader mode and extension shortcuts. Finally, it's rumoured that next year Apple will introduce a more powerful visual search feature to provide "information on consumer products", along the lines of the Visual Lookup feature for Siri.

As always we should note that these are rumours based on purported leaks, and even if they are being tested, there's no guarantee they'll all reach the next UI update. That said, they sound very plausible, and we've already seen Apple starting to take up its rivals' frequent use of AI in marketing materials with the launch of the latest MacBook Airs. They have the same chip as the M3 MacBook Pro from last year, but the chip's now suddenly being billed as great for AI (see the best deals on the laptop below).