One of the top Apple Intelligence features is a new set of system-wide AI writing tools. You can invoke these intelligent writing helpers anytime, anywhere to help you compose, edit, rewrite, summarize, reformat or proofread text.
In my experience, they can really streamline reformatting a document and can be helpful for making your written communication better. Here’s how to make the most of Apple Intelligence writing tools.
How to use Apple Intelligence AI writing tools
These days, AI writing tools like ChatGPT and Grammarly make it easier than ever to crank out reams of human-sounding copy or polish your existing documents. You can save tons of time utilizing them (although you must make sure they’re not generating gibberish). Apple Intelligence’s Writing Tools offer similar functionality, but in a much more convenient location: right on your iPhone, iPad or Mac.
The system-wide Writing Tools work in Apple apps like Pages, Messages and Safari, as well as most third-party apps and websites. Here’s how to take advantage of Apple’s free AI writing tools.
Table of contents: How to use Apple Intelligence AI writing tools
- Hardware and software requirements
- Enable Apple Intelligence
- Bring up the Apple Intelligence writing tools
- How all the writing tools work
- Summarize websites, emails, articles, any selectable text
Hardware and software requirements
The first Apple Intelligence features, including Writing Tools, arrived in iOS 18.1. (The second round of Apple’s AI features is available now in iOS 18.2.) To run Apple Intelligence features, you’ll need an iPhone, Mac or iPad with an M-series chip, an A17 Pro chip or greater.
Enable Apple Intelligence
If you’ve got the proper hardware and software, you need to turn on the Apple Intelligence features. To do so, open Settings > Apple Intelligence & Siri. Tap Join the Apple Intelligence waitlist to reserve your spot in line. The feature is being rolled out gradually, likely to test the impact it will have on Apple servers.
At the moment, the wait time isn’t very long — just a matter of minutes. That could change as more people sign up. After Apple lets you in, you’ll receive a notification. Downloading the AI models that power Apple Intelligence may take a while.
How to bring up the Apple Intelligence writing tools
Screenshot: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac
Apple’s Writing Tools are available anywhere you can type in text on your iPhone, Mac or iPad. That’s most apps — Safari, Notes, Mail, Messages and a plethora of third-party apps.
Use Writing Tools on iPhone or iPad
In iOS or iPadOS, tap the cursor to bring up the pop-up menu that says Copy, Paste, Select All. Swipe on the menu (or tap the arrow buttons) for more options; tap Writing Tools. Some apps like Notes and Mail may have an Apple Intelligence button in the toolbar; the icon looks like a seven-pointed spiral.
Use Writing Tools on Mac
On a Mac, just right-click and select Writing Tools from the context menu.
If you select text before you open Writing Tools, Apple’s AI will only analyze and apply to your selection. Otherwise, it’ll apply to everything in the text view.
How all the Apple Intelligence writing tools work
Screenshot: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac
Apple’s free AI Writing Tools make it quick and easy to proofread, rewrite, edit, summarize, organize and compose text. The feature offers multiple options for editing/rewriting and summarizing/formatting your words.
AI tools for editing and rewriting text
Describe your change lets you make a specific changes to a block of text, in weird and wonderful ways. You can try things like “Make it sound Shakespearean” or “Make everything opposite” (which usually leads to funny results). You can even give precise directions, like “Make everything title case” or “Make every verb italicized,” which genuinely impressed me.
Proofread looks for mistakes, poor punctuation and clumsily phrased sentences. It’s a good tool to use as a final check before sending an important piece of writing. It takes a moment to scan for typos, and then you can tap arrows to jump through the list of changes recommended by the AI writing tool. It’ll highlight where edits were made, and explain why it was changed. You can tap Use Original if you want to revert it. Revert in the upper left will reverse all the changes; Done will save its edits.
Rewrite rephrases the same information slightly differently. If you don’t like the way a sentence sounds but can’t get out of a rut, this is a good AI writing tool to use. You can tap Try Again to make it generate another rewrite, or tap Original to reverse it.
Friendly and Professional change the tone of your writing to be either more casual or more diplomatic. Like the above, you can try again or go back to the original.
Concise removes unnecessary, extraneous, superfluous words to make the sentence shorter, less long and have fewer words in it. (Should have tried it here.)
AI tools for summarizing and reformatting text
Summary and Key Points reduce the information down to a single sentence or a few bullet points. These don’t automatically replace the original text, so you can use this AI writing tool to pluck a thesis statement out of a long essay. You can Copy the results to paste it somewhere else, Replace the selection or Share the results using the system share sheet to Messages, Mail, Notes and third-party apps.
List and Table transform the formatting of the selection into a list of bullet points or organize the information into a multicolumn table. Tap Original to undo the changes.
Compose, powered by ChatGPT-4o, lets you ask OpenAI’s popular chatbot to write something from scratch based on a prompt. From the dropdown menu above the keyboard, you can choose how much context you want to send it based on what you’ve already written. You also can tap + to share a file or image.
Summarize websites, emails, articles or any selectable text
Screenshot: D. Griffin Jones/Cult of Mac
Apple Intelligence’s Writing Tools aren’t just for your own writing. You can invoke them on any selected text, not just inside a text editor. You can select this very paragraph and Apple’s AI writing tool rewrite it. On the iPhone, tap and hold to select and pick Writing Tools from the pop-up menu; on a Mac, click and drag to select, then right-click.
This often proves useful for work in marketing, publishing and many kinds of business communications. Select an article on the web to copy out its summary or key points. For instance, you could select some hastily written bullet points in an email, use Writing Tools to flesh things out and make everything sound professional, then copy and paste the text elsewhere. Or you could copy a Slack message, use Writing Tools convert it to AI-generated bullet points, and paste the results into a PowerPoint presentation. You can even select a lengthy compare-and-contrast paragraph, then use the AI writing tool to convert it into a simplified table.
More on Apple Intelligence
The free AI Writing Tools in Apple Intelligence can be pretty useful. Although I’m already a professional writer and likely won’t use the Rewrite or Professional tools, Proofread is a harmless final check you can get in the habit of using. And reformatting a lengthy document is a universal pain in the ass — “Let’s switch this to bullet points” or “Can we add a table?” can now be done in mere seconds.
- Remove an object from a photo with Apple Intelligence
- How to create photo memories with Apple Intelligence
- Hands-on with the first 10 Apple Intelligence features
- How to get Apple Intelligence features early — and in the EU
We originally published this article on Apple Intelligence’s AI Writing Tools on October 15, 2024. We updated the information.
