For schema conforming App Entities, does the synonyms API on DisplayRepresentation feed into Siri AI's natural language understanding of your app's entities?

At WWDC24, the guidance was that you could extend a schema conforming App Entity beyond its pre-defined shape with optional parameters, but that these would not be understood by Siri. In tandem, there was also CSSearchableItemAttributeSet properties but I don't recall how those were or were not understood by Siri. Could you please help clarify how these two related concepts work together going forward in terms of how entities are exposed across Spotlight, Shortcuts, and Siri.

For apps migrating from SiriKit to App Intents, is there a recommended way to test that an intent is actually discoverable by Siri AI — beyond just confirming the code compiles? Are there APIs to verify an intent is properly indexed and reachable via natural language? Divya Ravi, Senior iOS Engineer

Here are a variety questions around compatibility, some related to iOS 27 changes, some related to iOS / watchOS: Sometimes my AppShortcutProvider do not update properly. Do you a suggested series of actions to clean them up on the device after making changes? I have a lot of trouble getting watch apps to recognize shortcuts that I supply to them, and trigger phrases that work on the phone fail on the watch even when it hears all the words correctly. Do you have any suggestions for supporting watchOS? There are a number of .result() variants for AppIntents, and some are only compatible with iOS 26 / 27. Do you have any recommendations for how to offer support for iOS 18 devices too without completely sacrificing the new features especially in iOS 27? AppEntity(schema:) for iOS 27 greatly expanded its usefulness, but they are not backward-compatible. Is there a way to gate the usage of AppEntity(schema:) for just iOS 27 or gracefully degrade? How does the new Siri interact with AppShortcutProvider? Are they unnecessary as long as I have Intent Entities and Intents? Do they interfere?

In our application, we have dynamic records (sessions, workspaces, and logs) stored in a local SQLite database that is modified in real-time by a background command-line tool. We want Siri to resolve these as AppEntity types (e.g., 'Siri, show status of [Session Name]' or 'Siri, export log for [Project]'). Since EntityQuery requires returning list/suggested entities, how do we efficiently synchronize or query the external SQLite file from the App Intent extension? Are there file-locking or concurrency issues we should be aware of when the CLI tool is writing to the database while Siri is querying it? Is there a performance penalty or memory limit when returning thousands of dynamically generated AppEntity instances in suggestedEntities()? Should we implement custom indexing or virtual tables to support Siri's fuzzy name matching?

I'm trying to create an App Intent that takes in an image and copies it to a destination within my app. Sure, this can be done with shortcuts, but that's lame, I want siri to grab an image off the screen and invoke the action! Without an app schema, it doesn't seem like siri can tell what's possible in the app, so I'm trying to find a schema that fits? I've started trying to do this with the photos.addAssetsToAlbum App Intent schema, but it doesn't seem like Siri is onboard with the concept. It's replied many times that it is unable to add things to my App and that I should try via other means like opening my app and importing directly. Should be I be trying this with a different intent schema?

Is SiriKit now deprecated? And if so, how will that impact INAlternativeAppNames as it relates to app name synonyms in App Shortcuts?

In my app, I adopt ‘App Intents’ and ‘App Entities’ for various items and actions in my app. These work in the Shortcuts app, and users can use Find Intents to lookup information or use the intents to act up on them, even though they don’t map on to any of the specific App ‘Schemes’ and ‘Domains’ that are listed. If I'm using just App Entities and Intents on their own, would these participate with the new Siri AI, without any additional work? For example, in my app, I have entities like Contacts, Tags, and ‘Visit Logs’. I have intents for 'create tag’, ‘add tags to a contact’, add a ‘Log’ to a 'contact' etc. These are specified in the AppShortcutsProvider list, but I have more than 10 intents. How would these work with the new Apple Intelligence and Siri? Or does Siri integration require AppSchema adoption?

Will Siri only invoke Schema-based Intents? Is there no chance of Siri invoking another short cut, or share sheet extension with an input that its found on screen?

It's hard to know what should be working, and what's a symptom of the beta not including the functionality. Is there any functionality that we should expect to be present in beta 1?

It’s often desirable to implement AppIntents in an app extension, but under AppSchema this is more challenging because “on screen awareness” binds views to app entities. This creates a need to synchronize AppEntity data across the boundary between the main app and the app extension. What are the best practices for managing the required bidirectional data exchange? Are there good sample applications that illustrate how to do this cleanly?

Are there any tools this year to debug why siri can't see a schema-based intent or chooses not to invoke it? Is it possible to see what inputs siri has within the context of the conversation that could cascade into intents of other applications? I've had difficulties with knowing if something should work, or of it's just not possible.

For an AppIntent that creates an AppEntity via a long-running async task, does it make sense for the intent’s “perform” method to return a placeholder AppEntity and update it later via a donation, or is it best to make “perform” async and return only once the entity is completely resolved?

Currently, I have a mix of SiriKit (Car Commands) and App Intents. Should I migrate everything to App Intents and discontinue SiriKit? Is there a compatible/similar AppSchema to Car Commands?

In my app, I use CoreSpotlight to create CSSearchableItems (for Spotlight integration), and I also have a list of AppEntities for Shortcuts support. Are there any big benefits in migrating this setup to using IndexedEntity, with regards to Siri and Apple Intelligence? I also would need to support iOS17 for now. Note that the AppEntities don't map onto any existing AppSchema domains.

Is it possible to hand over from Siri to the App providing the App Intent (i.e. open the app from a Siri as result of an action)? For example, this could be handy when I actually want to show some UI in Response to a customer's prompt, like opening a Photo Album.

Is the user required to remember the name of my app in order to interact with it via Siri AI?

We have existing Siri functionalities in our app, for customer retrieve their bank or credit cards information. How can we leverage new Siri AI features to our existing function? what is correct approach we can go?

Is there a supported way to differentiate the trigger source (i.e. Siri, Spotlight, or Shortcut) within the perform() method of an AppIntent?

My app has had shortcuts support since the Siri Intent days, so I have app intents with CustomIntentMigratedAppIntent to make sure old shortcuts continue working. Now I need to make further changes to one such shortcuts actions so I need to make a 2nd app intent to take the place of my older app intent that itself took the place of a siri intent. I need the old app intent to still exist for the sake of old shortcuts but I find that having isDiscoverable = false doesn't hide the 1st app intent so long as it has CustomIntentMigratedAppIntent. Is there any solution or do I have to either break old shortcuts or accept duplicate shortcuts actions to move my app intents forward?