Apple agrees $250m settlement over delayed AI Siri features

TL;DR:

• Apple has agreed to pay $250m (£184m) to settle a US class action accusing it of falsely advertising a “personalised” Siri voice assistant alongside the iPhone 16 launch in 2024.
• The class covers around 36 million iPhone 16, 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max devices bought between 10 June 2024 and 29 March 2025; payments range from $25 to $95 per device, with no admission of fault.
• Resultsense view: this is a vendor-accountability marker UK procurement teams should note. Even Apple, the world’s most-watched consumer brand, has had to write a cheque for shipping AI marketing ahead of capability — the same risk that runs through enterprise AI vendor pitches today.

The settlement, filed on Tuesday in California federal court, would be one of the largest Apple has reached. It comes weeks before the company is expected to finally unveil an AI-enhanced Siri at its developer conference in June. The court must still approve the deal at a hearing on 17 June.

What the lawsuit alleged

The plaintiffs — a class of US iPhone buyers — argued that Apple “promoted AI capabilities that did not exist at the time, do not exist now, and will not exist for two or more years”, a category the complaint termed “vapourware”. The Better Business Bureau’s National Advertising Division had separately concluded Apple falsely suggested the new AI Siri was “available now”. A 2024 ad campaign featuring Bella Ramsey was pulled after Apple confirmed the personalised Siri would be delayed.

A Morgan Stanley survey cited in the complaint found “enhanced Siri” was the feature potential iPhone buyers most anticipated. On the May 2025 earnings call, chief executive Tim Cook conceded the Siri work was “taking a bit longer than we thought”.

Apple’s broader AI repositioning

The settlement lands as Apple is leaning more heavily on partners to ship AI features. The company integrated ChatGPT into iOS in 2024 and announced in January 2026 a deeper deal with Google to build Apple Intelligence on top of Gemini models and Google Cloud. Top AI executive John Giannandrea departed in December 2025, and Meta has reportedly poached Apple AI talent.

Looking forward

For UK enterprise buyers, the precedent is narrower than the headline suggests — only US iPhone 15 and 16 owners are eligible — but the principle travels. Marketing claims about agentic, personalised or “available now” AI capabilities are increasingly subject to advertising-standards scrutiny on both sides of the Atlantic. UK procurement contracts that lock in pricing on the strength of vendor roadmap claims should expect, at minimum, milestone-based clawbacks. Apple’s June developer conference is the next test of whether the long-promised personalised Siri actually arrives.