Apple has confirmed that Apple Intelligence will launch for iPhone users in mainland China with iOS 27.3 in December. Testing starts with the latest iOS developer beta from November 4, China time.
Only newer iPhones qualify: the iPhone 16 series and later, plus the iPhone 15 Pro, 15 Pro Max, iPhone Air and iPhone Duo. Siri AI and the other features Apple announced at WWDC 2026 are not part of this release.
Which iPhones get Apple Intelligence in China
Apple’s eligibility list for China is short. These models are supported:
- iPhone 16 series (every model) and later iPhones
- iPhone Duo
- iPhone Air
- iPhone 15 Pro
- iPhone 15 Pro Max
These models are not eligible:
- iPhone 15
- iPhone 15 Plus
- Every older iPhone
The base iPhone 15 and 15 Plus miss out because of Apple Intelligence’s hardware requirement, just as they do in other markets. Owners of the 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max from the same year are covered.
Your Siri and device language must also be set to Simplified Chinese or English for the features to work.
When the iOS 27.3 rollout starts
Developers can test the features from November 4 through the latest iOS developer beta. Everyone else in mainland China gets them with the public iOS 27.3 release in December.
Apple hasn’t named an exact December date. Mac, iPad and its other platforms will follow only after Apple receives the necessary approvals, and there’s no date for those either.
What’s in the first wave
Apple lists these features for the China launch:
- Live Translation: in Messages, FaceTime and Phone, plus in-person translation through supported AirPods
- Writing Tools: rewrite, proofread and summarize, plus a Qwen-powered Compose option
- Visual Intelligence
- Photos: Clean Up, natural-language search and Memory movie creation
- Genmoji
- Mail: Priority Messages, Mail summaries and Smart Reply, which also works in Messages
- Notifications: notification summaries, Priority Notifications and the Reduce Interruptions Focus
- Notes and calls: audio transcription summaries in Notes and call transcript summaries
- Siri: Type to Siri and a more natural Siri that keeps track of context
Live Translation through AirPods needs AirPods 5, AirPods 4 with ANC, AirPods Pro 2 or later, or AirPods Max 2. The earbuds need the latest firmware and must be paired with an eligible iPhone.
Where Alibaba’s Qwen fits in
Apple says the features run on generative models it built itself. Alibaba’s Qwen model is an add-on in selected parts of Siri, Writing Tools and Visual Intelligence, covering both text and image understanding.
Siri can hand selected requests to Qwen, including questions about photos and documents such as PDFs and presentations. In Writing Tools, the Compose option lets Qwen write original text from scratch.
To use Qwen, you sign in with a Qwen account or with Sign in with Apple. That sign-in step is worth noting if you’d rather keep your requests within Apple’s own models.
What’s missing: Siri AI
Apple states that this update does not include Siri AI or the other next-generation Apple Intelligence features it showed at WWDC 2026. Elsewhere, Siri AI is the headline iOS 27 feature.
Outside China, iOS 27.2 gave Siri AI memory, app controls and five languages. In China, December’s update brings Apple’s current Apple Intelligence set, but not its newest assistant.
Sources: Apple China Newsroom, Apple China
