Apple will charge iCloud+ fees for heavy use of new Siri AI

Apple is trying to close an awkward chapter. Siri AI, delayed since 2024 and now in an advanced beta of iOS 27, is slated to arrive “later this year,” not necessarily on the September operating-system launch. In the most recent investor call, CEO Tim Cook confirmed for the first time that heavy users of the voice assistant will need to pay through an iCloud+ subscription upgrade. This is the first time Apple has adopted the business model already common among other AI companies.

The structure Cook described mirrors the AI pricing trends of the past two years. Siri AI will be offered for free to Apple users with compatible Apple Intelligence hardware, but it will include a rate limit, with daily or hourly usage caps. Users who want larger quotas will have to purchase a monthly upgrade package. Cook did not say whether the limits will be folded into existing iCloud+ plans or if Apple will create entirely new packages for the launch.

The rationale for the charge lies in the behind-the-scenes operating costs. The flagship feature of Siri AI, Private Cloud Compute, routes every request that requires cloud processing to Apple Silicon-based servers, where it is processed securely and deleted immediately, without Apple accessing the data. This architecture is expensive to run, and Apple needs to cover the expense from users who flood the system with requests. Cook also addressed privacy, saying “early reviews emphasize Apple’s approach to building private AI based on personal context.”

The open question now is not only how much the upgrade will cost, but what limits will apply to free users and how many requests per day will trigger a block and a payment prompt. Cook did not provide numbers in the investor call, and they are likely to be revealed only as the launch approaches. Apple has not yet published the list of devices that will support the new Siri AI beyond those already supporting Apple Intelligence.