iosmac.es reported on October 31, 2026, that Apple planned to start Apple Intelligence testing in China on November 4 in the next iOS developer beta, with public availability planned for December alongside iOS 27.3.
Qwen is assigned selected requests
According to iosmac.es, Alibaba’s Qwen would handle selected requests involving Siri, Writing Tools and Visual Intelligence. The reported initial feature set also includes:
- Writing Tools and Visual Intelligence questions about photos, PDFs and presentations.
- Live translation in Messages, FaceTime and Phone, plus Genmoji.
- Photo object cleanup and natural-language photo search, priority notifications, notification summaries and Smart Reply.
The report says Apple’s redesigned Siri AI is excluded from the initial China rollout. For the iPhone experience, it lists signing in with an Alibaba account or using Sign in with Apple.
The reported first phase is for selected iPhones
iosmac.es listed the iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max, iPhone 16 and later, iPhone Air, and iPhone Duo. It said both Siri and the device language must be English or Simplified Chinese; Traditional Chinese is excluded from the initial language set.
The report described the initial phase as iPhone-only, with Mac and iPad awaiting further regulatory approvals.
Earlier approval and Mac support reports
Quartz reported on July 15 that China’s Cyberspace Administration had listed Apple’s AI service among approved providers. Quartz said the regulator did not specify a launch date.
MacRumors reported on August 10 that Apple had briefly posted a China support guide for eligible Macs, then removed it by August 9. The guide reportedly required macOS 26.6 or later and a Qwen account. It also said Alibaba could not use submitted materials to train or improve its models. For the reported iPhone experience, iosmac.es described a different sign-in choice: an Alibaba account or Sign in with Apple.
