Siri Suggestions is a powerful search feature that suggests what you might want to do next. Its results are based on your device usage, including how often you may use apps and at what time of day.
It might suggest you send a message to a friend or confirm an appointment in your calendar if it’s due.
Siri can provide suggestions using both built and third-party apps.
As Siri learns from your behavior, it might start to make suggestions when you:
- Create Calendar events: when you start adding people or places to an event, Siri may make suggestions based on previous entries.
- Travel notifications: if you have an event coming up on your Calendar, Siri will recommend a time to leave and provide information on how long the journey may take, including traffic conditions.
- Search in Safari: recommending websites as you type.
- Type: by making suggestions based on things you’ve looked at on your iPhone or iPad recently.
- Look at the lock screen: Siri may recommend an app you regularly use around that time, such as prompting you to start a workout.
- Read News stories: Siri will learn which articles you like based on your reading behavior.
How to use Siri Suggestions
Siri Suggestions works automatically, making recommendations when it thinks you need them. However, you can access the feature manually by using Spotlight, the iPhone and iPad’s built-in search function.
iOS 16 introduced a Spotlight search bubble that sits at the bottom of the Home screen, just above the dock. Touch on it to type in your search term, or tap on the microphone to speak it.
If you want to stable the search bubble, you can disable it in Settings > Home Screen, then toggle off Show on Home Screen.
To access Spotlight If you’re using iOS 15 or below, while on the Home screen, place your finger on the center of the screen and swipe down. A search field will appear. Either type in your search term or tap on the microphone icon to speak it instead.
You can search for practically anything using Siri Suggestions.
By default, the Siri Suggestions results will display a grid of apps it thinks you might need at that moment and a shortlist of shortcuts to oft-performed tasks. These could be anything, from viewing a webpage to sending a text message.
Siri will also search the internet, Siri Knowledge, iCloud, and on your device for files, music, news, and even make suggestions for apps in the app store.
To search for something else from the results page:
- Tap the text field at the bottom of the screen to call up the keyboard.
- Tap the ‘x’ icon to remove your current search terms.
- Type or speak your new search query.
Is Siri Suggestions safe and secure?
Siri will sync everything it learns about your behavior between all devices logged in using the same Apple ID. This information is encrypted and remains private.
How to turn Siri Suggestions on or off
Turn Siri Suggestions on
Siri Suggestions is turned on by default on new devices. Still, you can manually enable or disable it at any time.
- Open the Settings app.
- Tap Siri & Search.
- Turn on (toggle to green) Allow Notifications, Show in App Library & Spotlight, Show When Sharing, and Show When Listening.
Turn Siri Suggestions off
You can turn off Siri Suggestions if you’d prefer to search your iPhone or iPad without having Siri suggest what apps to use or websites to check out.
- Open the Settings app.
- Tap Siri & Search.
- Turn off (toggle to gray) Allow Notifications, Show in App Library & Spotlight, Show When Sharing, and Show When Listening.
How to turn off Siri Suggestions in Look Up
When selecting text in iOS, one option offered in the pop-up dialogue is Look Up. Look Up will provide definitions of highlighted words in the dictionary and suggest websites, apps, music, and films relevant to your selected text.
If you’d prefer to be able to use the Look Up feature on your iPhone or iPad without Siri suggesting any apps or websites, follow these steps.
- Open the Settings app.
- Tap Siri & Search.
- Toggle the Show in Look Up switch to off.
How to disable Siri Suggestions for individual apps
If you want to prevent Siri from looking through your apps when searching for suggestions, you can change the settings on an app-by-app basis.
- Open the Settings app.
- Tap Siri & Search.
- Scroll down and tap on the name of the app you would like to change.
- Turn off Show in Home Screen, Suggest App, and Suggest Notifications.
Prevent Siri Suggestions from sending your location information to Apple
Suggestions use your location to give more relevant results, such as searching for a restaurant. If you’d prefer not to send your location data to Apple:
- Open Settings scroll down and tap on Privacy & Security.
- Tap on Location Services.
- Scroll down to the bottom of the screen and select System Services.
- Turn off Location-Based Suggestions.
