Not everyone is going to love Siri, Apple’s voice assistant. Here’s how to permanently turn off Siri on your iPhone or iPad if you don’t find it useful or if you continually activate it by accident using the Side button or the “Hey Siri” phrase. This article also serves as a guide on how to turn off Siri Suggestions on your iPhone, iPad, and AirPods.
Enjoy the ride!
Overview
The way many people use their iPhones and other Apple products has changed dramatically since Siri was first introduced in 2011. Apple’s intelligent personal assistant can carry out a variety of tasks using straightforward voice commands, respond to inquiries, make suggestions, provide directions, and even communicate with a wide range of smart home accessories and appliances, including Apple HomeKit gadgets. One of the most useful and well-liked iPhone shortcuts is the ability to ask it to perform a task for you.
It is an extremely helpful feature that has become an integral part of many iPhone users’ daily routines, but there may be times when you’d rather not have this intelligent assistant prying on your every move. Whether you’re concerned about privacy, trying to conserve battery life, or just don’t want to deal with Siri’s suggestions, we’ll teach you how to turn off Siri and Siri’s suggestions on your iPhone.
How to Turn Off Siri
Siri must be activated on a new iPhone before you can use it for the first time. If you don’t enable it in settings, she won’t work. You can disable it on your iPhone with a few taps if you decide not to use it. Here is how to turn off Siri on Airpods:
- Listen for “Hey Siri.”
- Tap the side button to access Siri
- If you wish to turn off Siri functionality on the Lock screen but leave it enabled elsewhere, select the option to “Allow Siri When Locked.”
- When you disable the first two options, a confirmation prompt will appear to ensure that you wish to disable it. Click the “Turn off Siri” button to disable it. Your iPhone and iPad’s Siri feature has been deactivated.
By disabling this setting, your iPhone will no longer react to the “Hey Siri” wake phrase, and it will no longer be able to hear your voice commands. However, if you have an iPhone X or a later model, holding down the Side button (or Home button) will activate it manually. Even if you turn off “Hey, Siri” in Settings, it will still work with CarPlay. Turn off the “Press Side Button for Siri” option here to completely disable it.
If you change your mind and want to turn it back on, just do the opposite of what you just did. Then it will be turned back on, and you may use Apple’s virtual assistant once more. It’s also a good idea to clean the charging port on your iPhone every so often.
How to Turn Off Siri’s Suggestions
Siri may give you recommendations in a variety of ways, in addition to the aforementioned features. Siri’s suggestions include apps to download, keywords to use in an online search, and phone numbers and/or contacts to call or text. These have the potential to be both beneficial and annoying. There are several options available to you if you find Siri’s suggestions annoying or simply don’t want to see them while using your iPhone. The following are ways to turn off Siri suggestions:
- Open the iPhone’s Settings menu.
- Drag down the menu and select “Siri & Search.”
- Click the switch next to “Show Suggestions” under “Before Searching” to turn it off.
If you want to turn off certain Siri suggestions, you may do so by toggling off the switches next to categories like “Show when Sharing” and “Show when Listening” under “Suggestions from Apple.” You may turn off Siri suggestion alerts altogether by switching off “Allow Notifications.”
You must turn off Siri suggestions for each individual app in order to stop app-specific suggestions from appearing. Here’s what you should do:
- To access this feature, open the Settings app and navigate to the “Siri & Search” submenu. There is a list of all the apps that it can interact with on your device.
- To turn off Siri’s suggestions entirely or make changes to them, launch the app in question.
The toggles that allow you to turn off Siri suggestions will be presented in a variety of ways, depending on the app. For instance, you may prevent Siri suggestions from showing up on the Home Screen when the app is in the background by turning off in-app search recommendations.
How to Turn Off “Hey Siri” Without Any Help
The “Hey Siri” command used to activate Siri with your voice has gotten better at recognizing it. Still, some bugs can cause your iPhone to think you’re talking normally when you’re calling Siri. Fortunately, you can easily turn off this feature of Siri without turning off the virtual assistant altogether. Here is how to turn off “Hey Siri”:
Step 1: Open the iPhone’s or iPad’s Settings menu.
Here is Step 2: Click Siri and Search.
Step 3: Disable at the topmost toggle Pay attention to the “Hey Siri” command.
Step 4: You can still activate Siri whenever you like by pressing and holding the side button, but your iPhone or iPad will no longer listen for the key phrase. You may easily reactivate “Hey Siri” by following the instructions above; just keep in mind that you’ll need to retrain it for your voice by saying a few sample phrases again.
How to Turn Off Siri iCloud Sync
Siri heavily relies on machine learning to tailor its recommendations to your life and routines. Every time you use Siri, it should become increasingly tailored to your needs and preferences. The machine learning capabilities of Siri may be synced across all of your Apple devices using iCloud. If you enable iCloud sharing while setting up your iPhone or iPad, it will be enabled by default. However, you may disable it at any time by going into your iCloud settings and turning it off.
Step 1: Open the Settings application on your iOS device, and then select your name.
Step 2: Select iCloud.
Step 3: Click Show All.
Step 4: Find the Siri toggle and press the off button.
Reversing the previous steps lets you swiftly turn it back on if you change your mind.
Before Siri Could Read Messages, It Could Only Announce Notifications
Announce Notifications is a function of Siri that was initially released by Apple for use with AirPods and Beats headphones. If you own one of these gadgets, you can follow the instructions below to activate the feature on your iOS device (iPhone or iPad).
- Click Settings > Notifications.
- Select the Notifications menu, then tap Announce Notifications to turn them on.
Once activated, it will notify you whenever you receive a notification from a supported app, like Messages, Reminders, or one of Apple’s own apps. However, you must be using locked AirPods or Beats headphones with your iPhone or iPad for it to activate them.
You may also customize the alerts that Siri will read out loud. Time-sensitive, one-on-one, or universal alerts are all options. Simply select Time Sensitive or Direct Messages from the Announce Notifications menu under Settings > Notifications > Announce Notifications.
Read Also: How To Turn On Siri In A Few Easy Steps
Then It Began Announcing Notifications through the iPhone or iPad Speakers
With the release of iOS 16 and iPadOS 16, Apple made the Announce Notifications functionality with Siri available to virtually all iOS device owners. It can now make announcements and read complete texts aloud through the speakers, because of an update made by Apple.
If you don’t want to interact with your iPhone or iPad every time it alerts you to a new notification, you can listen to the full alert without your headphones. Of course, this only applies if you’ve activated this option. If you haven’t, you can turn on Announce Notifications with Siri through your device’s speaker by following the easy steps below:
- Select Accessibility in the Settings menu on your iPhone or iPad.
- Select the Siri button, and then turn on the speaker announcements.
- Select the apps you want to get notifications from under Announce Notifications From after tapping Announce Notifications.
- Select the apps whose alerts and messages you wish to have read aloud by Siri in step 3, and then enable Announce alerts on Speaker. That’s really neat, huh? Okay, not at all.
Siri reading your messages out loud through the iPhone’s or iPad’s speakers is a huge no-no if you want to keep them secret. So, if you don’t want it to announce new messages and alerts over the iPhone’s or iPad’s speakers, you may turn off it’s ability to read messages by following the instructions below.
How to Turn Off Siri’s Read Messages Feature
To prevent Siri from reading out loud any incoming alerts or messages, just turn off Announce Notification on Speaker as indicated above. The procedure is the same whether you’re asking how to turn off Siri’s read messages feature on your AirPods or not. If you’d rather have it read out alerts and messages through the device’s speakers instead of your AirPods, you can easily disable the feature by turning off the Headphones option under Announce When Connected To. If you choose, you may use the Control Center to turn off it’s read messages feature. You have the option of doing so for an hour or the entire day.
Here’s how to turn off Siri’s read messages feature:
- The Control Panel can be accessed by swiping down from the top right corner of the display.
- To completely turn off the feature, tap the bell icon.
- You may also tap and hold the icon to bring up a menu in a pop-up window.
- You can choose to turn off Announce Notifications for an hour or all day from this menu.
You may turn off Announce Notifications in Control Center by going to Settings > Control Center > Announce Notifications. You can also turn off the Siri read messages feature from Control Center by tapping the minus sign.
Does Siri Listen All the Time?
It no longer listens in on your conversations as of 2022. Technologies like Siri’s voice assistant are always listening to their user’s command phrases. This is the “Hey Siri” or equivalent command for it. Even though, it is always on the lookout for that phrase but doesn’t actually start recording until it hears it.
Can It Record My Conversations?
Apple keeps records of all of your Siri conversations and may read over a selection of them at some point. Your voice input, Hey Siri configuration, contacts, and location may all be sent to Apple so that it can fulfill your request. Your Apple ID is not linked to the stored information.
Can Anyone Access My Siri?
If an iPhone is set up so that Siri can be used from the lock screen, then anyone who has access to the phone can use it to unlock it. It has recently been discovered through research that hackers can remotely access it on an iPhone when headphones are connected.
Can Siri Tell You Who Owns a Phone?
The question “Who owns this iPhone?” to Siri is one you should try. similarly to “Whose iPhone is this?” Siri will display her best assumption. Hopefully, the owner has provided enough contact information so that you can get in touch.
What Can Siri Not Do?
- Adjust brightness.
- Report on available storage.
- Report on the remaining battery.
- Download an app.
- Open an app.
- Adjust the volume.
- Turn them on or off.
- Sending content to them.
Is Siri Safe for Privacy?
Apple is committed to being open and honest and providing parents with the resources they need to make the best decisions for their children. Apple also claims that Siri queries and searches are tied to a different identifier than an Apple ID, so no personally identifiable information is collected for marketing purposes.
Final Thoughts
Despite Siri’s usefulness for many people, there are times when it’s best to turn off Siri, either temporarily or permanently. Apple gives iPhone users a lot of power over how they use their phones, as well as some useful tricks. Turn off Siri and Siri suggestions on your iPhone, so you can take back control of how it works and protect your privacy by not letting Apple’s smart helper listen in. In the end, it’s up to you, but following the aforementioned steps should make customizing your iPhone’s virtual assistant a breeze.
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