Siri is the by-default lady AI who talks to you on your iPhone. As advertised by Apple, Siri is faster and more accessible, and you can do all kinds of things with her. Siri exists on every Apple operating system, be it the iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, TV, or Mac. If you didn’t know, Siri also has its male-voice option, and you can use it with an American, a British, or an Australian accent.
Other AI assistants, like Siri, include Amazon’s Alexa, Google Assistant, Microsoft’s Cortana, and Samsung’s Bixby.
While Siri may be helpful, you may find her a bother. Eventually, you may decide to turn her off. This article will guide you on how to turn off Siri on iOS devices.
Why turn off Siri?
Here are some reasons you could have for wanting to turn Siri off. She may be:
- Finding it hard to pick your accent.
- Requiring from you some stiff-as-a-board controls.
- Lacking some answers you need.
- experiencing difficulties in finding her voice (verbalizing)
- You find it annoying.
You can turn Siri completely off or reduce the amount of control she has over your phone. Instead of shutting her down completely, you can deactivate her on iCloud sync, Suggestions, or the Suggestions’ Widgets.
The way to do it
These steps should work just fine, especially if you’re using iOS 11 or 12:
To wholly turn off Siri
- On your iPhone’s home screen, swipe to the page where the ‘Settings’ button is and tap on it.
- Choose ‘Siri & Search’ on the screen that displays. The option is just below “Wallpaper.”
- Under the ‘Ask Siri’ section, there are three options whose sliders have been activated. These are Listen for “Hey Siri,” “Press Side Button for Siri,” along with “Allow Siri When Locked.” Deactivate them by tapping on the sliders.
- Once you tap on all the sliders, a pop-up menu will appear with the title “Turn Off Siri.”
- Tap on the blue-colored “Turn Off Siri.” You would have turned her off completely. You will be notified that the information Siri uses to respond to your request will be removed from Apple Servers.
On iOS 10, the steps are pretty simple – tap on the ‘Settings’ icon on the home screen and then “Siri.” Here, tap the slider button to turn Siri off.
Siri’s iCloud Sync
- Having tapped on the ‘Settings’ icon, you will be opened to a screen where you will see your name at the top.
- On the screen that appears, tap on the ‘iCloud’ choice in the second section, just below ‘Payment and Shipping.’
- All the apps that depend on iCloud will be displayed. Tap on the slider next to ‘Siri’ if it’s activated so that you can turn it off.
Siri’s Suggestions and Suggestions’ Widgets
These other two are very straightforward. Follow the steps below:
Suggestions: Settings > Siri & Search > turn off the three options which are “in Search,” “in Look Up,” and “on Lock Screen.”
Suggestion Widgets: Today View > Edit > tap ‘-’ sign next to ‘Siri App Suggestions’ > on the right and tap Remove.
Simple and smooth?
You can show Siri that she is not in control by either turning her off wholly or partly.
If the time comes that you need to reactivate it, you need to reverse any of the above steps that you have taken.
