Getting broken up with over text is hard enough, but imagine if you received an AI summary of a breakup to give you the bad news. That’s what happened to one iPhone user with Apple Intelligence who’s now single and ready to mingle.
One of Apple Intelligence’s biggest features in iOS 18.1 is notification summaries which condenses messages, emails, and other pop-ups into easily digestible bullet points. Unfortunately, however, Apple Intelligence can't quite get the gist when it comes to having a touch of humanity.
Taking to X, user @spreen_co shared an image of his ex-girlfriend breaking up with him. The Apple Intelligence summary reads “No longer in a relationship; wants belongings from the apartment.”
He followed up with, “Yes this was real… Yes it happened yesterday… Yes it was my birthday.” The tweet went viral with 3.8 million views, which might soften the blow a little, but won’t replace his relationship.
for anyone who’s wondered what an apple intelligence summary of a breakup text looks like pic.twitter.com/4C0K1GcrbFOctober 10, 2024
Apple Intelligence notification summaries
Apple Intelligence notification summaries are incredibly useful when they work, but they lack human empathy and often get the wrong end of the stick. I’ve written about notification summaries in the past, calling the tool the “one Apple Intelligence feature you'll want to turn off right away”.
In my testing, the funniest examples have popped up when multiple notifications of the same thing pile up. For example, my Ring doorbell notifications are often summarized into “5-7 people at your front door”, which is pretty hilarious considering it sounds like there’s about to be a home invasion.
When it works, however, notification summaries is probably the most useful Apple Intelligence feature that will grace your iPhone when iOS 18.1 launches later this month. Condensing information to give you a quick glance of things like a shopping list from your partner or a date and time to meet someone are what the feature excels at, it’s just a shame that it doesn’t quite understand what it means to be human.
