Apple's new Siri Recap beta on the Series 12 and Ultra 4 listens through your day and writes summaries. One early tester was impressed, and privacy questions remain.
Apple has released a beta of watchOS 27.3 with a feature called Siri Recap. It takes notes on your conversations during the day and turns them into short summaries. It is for owners of the Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4. Apple's own description says it helps you stay present in the moment while still remembering what was said.
Siri Recap ambiently takes notes on your conversations and uses Apple Intelligence to write high-level summaries. You read them later in the Siri app. Recaps can delete themselves after up to 7 days unless you choose to save them. A second new feature, Live Rewind, arrives in the same beta. The material does not explain what Live Rewind does. Apple groups both under the name Audio Intelligence and announced them at its September keynote.
Ryan Christoffel of 9to5Mac turned it on after installing the iOS and watchOS 27.3 betas on a Tuesday. The next day, he found a detailed record of his afternoon and evening. After a family shopping trip, the recap listed the size of a table runner they had looked at. He did not remember anyone mentioning it. A recap also saved the songs his son played on a HomePod at breakfast.
He said he saw nothing in his recaps that he would call too sensitive. That is one person's early experience with a beta, not a broad test.
The feature has drawn controversy, because once it is on, the watch is effectively always listening. Apple points to these protections:
Owners of a Series 12 or Ultra 4 who join the beta should look at the privacy settings before enabling Siri Recap. Choose the auto-delete period and decide where and when it should stay off. Everyone else has no action to take.
The feature is still in beta, and the material gives no release date for the final version. It also does not say whether older watches will get it. Details on Live Rewind are missing too.
If you own a Series 12 or Ultra 4, set the auto-delete period and off-times for Siri Recap before you switch it on.
Bose's new 23-inch TV Speaker costs $299 and, in one reviewer's tests, made dialogue clearer than the pricier Sonos Beam 2.
Read more: Bose's small $299 soundbar makes dialogue clearer than pricier rivalsIn a hand-counted 4,500-step walk, the $180 Fitbit Edge was off by 8 steps and the $800 Apple Watch Ultra 4 by 51. Both did the job well.
Read more: A $180 Fitbit counted steps more closely than an $800 Apple WatchA growing set of companies sell phones for kids that limit who can call and what they can see, with prices starting around $99.
Read more: Phones built for kids are booming, from $99 phones to landlines
