Back when Apple released its iOS 18.2 update, it brought several new Apple Intelligence features to your iPhone 16 (or iPhone 15 Pro/Pro Max), centered mostly around image generation and Visual Intelligence on iPhone 16. At the same time, Apple also integrated ChatGPT into its AI tools, including Siri, and it can be incredibly useful. Here are all the places that ChatGPT has been added to iOS and how you can use them to turbocharge AI on your iPhone.
Note: This article focuses on the iPhone, but you can also use ChatGPT on an iPad or Mac.
What is ChatGPT?
ChatGPT is a generative artificial intelligence chatbot developed by OpenAI. It can generate text, speech, and images based on user prompts, including code, essays, drawings, and music. On the iPhone, it’s primarily used to provide answers to certain requests that Siri is unable to answer, including questions about photos and documents.
On iOS 18 iPhones, ChatGPT is powered by the GPT-4o model, but in iOS 26 it will be getting an upgrade to the newest GPT-5 model that launched in August 20205. According to OpenAI, GPT-5 is “a unified system that knows when to respond quickly and when to think longer to provide expert-level responses.”
How to enable ChatGPT on iPhone
You don’t need a ChatGPT account to start using it on your iPhone, but you do need to turn it on. Open Settings > Apple Intelligence & Siri and look for the ChatGPT menu under the “Extensions” heading. If and when Apple integrates other AI services, they’ll also appear here.
In the ChatGPT menu, tap Set Up... and you’ll get a pop-up card telling you what you can do with ChatGPT. Tap Next, then on the next card tap “Enable ChatGPT” or “Use ChatGPT with an Account.”
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You’ll also see a “Confirm ChatGPT Requests” toggle that is enabled by default. Any time Siri or any other AI tool wants to use ChatGPT, you’ll be prompted first. Turning it off will let you chat uninterrupted, but you’ll always be asked before sending any sort of image to ChatGPT, regardless of how you set this toggle.
Apple shares very limited information with OpenAI, only what is strictly necessary to fulfill the request, but leaving this enabled means you have to opt into every request. That can be a good thing, but if you’re not so concerned or bothered by the constant requests, you can turn this off so your interaction flow will be a lot smoother.
Sign in to your ChatGPT account
If you want to sign into your ChatGPT account later, you’ll find a Sign In option in the ChatGPT menu. Being signed in will keep a record of all your ChatGPT requests in your ChatGPT account–when you use the ChatGPT app (mobile or desktop) you’ll find the history of all your ChatGPT requests from Siri and elsewhere within iOS.
There’s a daily limit to how many “advanced” requests you can make if you’re not a ChatGPT subscriber, and you’ll see a note on this page if you’re over the limit. You’ll get less-advanced “basic” results until the next day. If you have a ChatGPT Plus subscription, logging in lets you make all the advanced requests you want.
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How to use ChatGPT in Siri
Now that Chat GPT is turned on, let’s start using it. The most prominent place to use ChatGPT is when interacting with Siri. As long as ChatGPT is enabled, Siri will automatically turn to ChatGPT for anything it doesn’t know the answer to. This means answers involving personal information on your phone will always be handled by Siri, as well as certain general knowledge questions, but ChatGPT can answer far more than Siri ever could.
You can also force Siri to use ChatGPT even on a question it would normally answer itself, by adding “Ask ChatGPT” before it. “Hey Siri, ask ChatGPT if dogs can eat broccoli” gives you an answer from OpenAI’s chatbot instead of Apple’s.
The real fun starts when you ask ChatGPT to do things Siri never does. Try “Ask ChatGPT to compose a short thank-you letter to my mom” or “Ask ChatGPT to create a two-day itinerary for visiting San Francisco.”
You can even use OpenAI’s image-generation tools. For example, in the example below, I asked ChatGPT to create an image of a Siamese cat in a ninja outfit. The image generation capabilities of ChatGPT are far more advanced and less restrictive than Image Playground.
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ChatGPT can also analyze images and what’s on your screen. If you tell Siri to ask ChatGPT something about a web page you’re looking at, you’ll be prompted to send either a screenshot or full web page content to ChatGPT for an answer. For example, you can find a recipe online and ask ChatGPT to summarize it, or take a photo of some ingredients and ask ChatGPT what dishes you can make with them.
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When looking at a photo in the Photos app, ask Siri to ask ChatGPT something about it, and you’ll be prompted to send the image to ChatGPT for analysis.
How to use ChatGPT with Writing Tools
With Apple Intelligence, any text box has the option to enable the Writing Tools menu (by tapping the Apple Intelligence button in Notes and some other apps, or tapping and holding in a text entry area). But in iOS 18.2, you’ll also see a “Compose” option at the bottom of the Writing Tools popup.
Tap it and you’ll be given a prompt where you can describe whatever you want ChatGPT to write. It can be a poem, a short invitation to a birthday party, a piece of fiction, or a technical document. When it’s done, you’ll be able to able to type in the prompt window about ways to refine the output or have the option to just rewrite it from your original prompt. You’ll even have a few one-tap suggestions from ChatGPT.
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ChatGPT’s image generation works here, too! Just use a prompt that makes it clear you’re looking for an image rather than text, such as the image below of “a sad puppy on a rainy day…”
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How to use ChatGPT in Visual Intelligence
New to the iPhone 16 in iOS 18.2 is Visual Intelligence. Long-press the Camera Control button to launch a new camera search interface—snap a picture of a business to see ratings and hours, of a common product to see a link to its website, of text to summarize or translate it, and more.
Alongside the “Search” button, you’ll see a persistent “Ask” button that will ask ChatGPT about what you’re looking at. ChatGPT is able to identify lots of plants and animals, for example, and a text input box at the bottom of the screen lets you ask follow-up questions like “Is this poisonous?”, “How many calories does this have?”, or “Does this have good reviews?”
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Author: Jason Cross, Senior Editor, Macworld
Jason has written about technology for more than 25 years - first in the gaming press, then focusing on enthusiast PCs and general technology. He enjoys learning how complicated technology works and explaining it in a way anyone can understand.