Using Gemini on my iPhone proves how far behind Apple is on AI

There’s plenty to dive into with Apple Intelligence and Google Gemini, but for the vast majority of mobile users, there’s only one option on the market right now — that’s Gemini. The Android crowd has been playing with Google’s AI assistant for months now, and the recent rollout of the same app for iOS means that iPhone users can start meaningfully playing with AI, too.

Of course, there’s the Apple Intelligence beta to try, provided you switch your device to US English and sign up for the thankfully short waitlist (at least in my case). It’s not a tall ask, but only iPhone enthusiasts will bother jumping through these hoops, especially if they live outside the US.

Even then, you’ll need an iPhone 15 Pro or a new iPhone 16 model running iOS 18.1, and there are further restrictions on features for EU and Chinese residents. For most iPhone owners, Apple Intelligence still isn’t on the radar as we approach 2025, despite being announced back in June 2024.

By comparison, you can grab Gemini on any Android device with 2GB of RAM running Android 10 or newer, which is a hugely wide net. For iPhones and iPads, the requirements are equally low: just iOS 16 or newer. If that’s not enough, Gemini supports over 28 languages and 195 territories; Apple supports just one language. The bottom line is that anyone looking to try out AI, iPhone users included, will have a much easier time getting hold of and using Gemini than Apple’s beta toolset.

Of course, the standalone Gemini app and Apple Intelligence are quite different in scope. Apple is looking to integrate AI more broadly than through a single app, offering notification summaries, reply suggestions and text rewriting tools, image editing (Google Photos’ superior Magic Editor works on iOS too, by the way), and web page summaries. It’s more akin to Galaxy AI than the experience you’ll see using the Gemini app alone.

Still, my hands-on with Apple Intelligence has left me with mixed impressions. Siri is apparently smarter, yet it is still limited to short responses and routines rather than being a more intelligent all-around helper. In lieu of being able to remap the button, my solution is to launch Gemini via the Action Button, then it’s just a click away to chat with the more impressive Gemini Live. Plus, that puts image generation and camera-based queries at my fingertips. Early access to Apple’s Image Playground is locked behind the iOS 18.2 beta. As good as notification summaries are, Q&A-style chats are what I find the most useful, and Gemini excels at this. Siri does not.

As I only dabble in iOS a few times a year, I might not be deeply integrated enough to see the benefits of Siri’s cross-app capabilities. But Gemini plays nicely with all my Google apps, even when stepping outside its OS, making it the better tool to become familiar with across platforms. I’m still experimenting with Apple Intelligence and figuring out how it all stacks up next to Gemini and other Android features I’ve become used to, but one thing’s clear to me: Apple is a long way behind the competition. However, I suppose that much is obvious by now.

Nearly six months later, Apple remains in “early access” and beta for features that Google and Samsung have had for the better part of a year (or even longer in some cases), and early impressions are telling. Apple’s best features are smart integrations like notification and Mail summaries, but these hardly feel like cutting-edge AI compared to the broader capabilities of large language models, like Gemini or ChatGPT, of which Siri is certainly no competitor.

Compare the currently restrictive state of access, single language option, and small number of supported devices with the ease of access to Google’s Magic Editor and now Gemini (arguably the two most useful tools in the suite), and it’s clear that Google is moving quickly to bring AI to almost everyone while Apple is still polishing its rough edges. Ironically, Google has already brought AI features to more iPhone owners than Apple ever will.

Apple will get there eventually, I imagine, but by then, Android and Google will be well into their next-generation AI. If you have an iPhone, don’t wait months for Apple Intelligence to finally arrive in finished form. Download the iOS Gemini app today and see what all the fuss is about.