Siri has primarily been a voice based assistant. While other assistants like Microsoft’s Cortana and Google Assistant have the ability to text to the assistant, Siri remained voice only. iOS 11 finally adds the ability to type to Siri. This will come in really handy when you’re in a position where you can’t talk out loud to your virtual personal assistant.
How Type to Siri Works
iOS 11 has a new accessibility setting that switches you to a text mode for Siri. Using this mode, you’ll be able to use the keyboard to type out questions to Siri. And Siri will reply on screen. It won’t read out the answers.
Google Assistant lets you use both voice and keyboard in the same view. Siri does not. You have to expressly switch to Type to Siri mode.
When enabled, you’ll find a keyboard propped up and ready to go. Type your question or just a keyword like weather and you’ll see the response on the screen. The keyboard will go away and you’ll still see a text input box at the bottom of the screen.
Yes, this isn’t the ideal way we’d want to use this feature. But as it’s under Accessibility, the implementation makes sense. And if you have hearing issues, you can finally switch to this mode and start using Siri. For others, we’ll need to make a choice if switching to the keyboard mode is useful enough to permanently give up on the voice assistant functionality (including Hey Siri feature).
How to Switch to Type to Siri Mode
Step 1: Open Settings app from the Home screen.
Step 2: From General, select Accessibility.
Step 3: Tap on Siri.
Step 4: In this section, tap on the toggle next to Type to Siri.
Will You Switch to This Mode?
Is this feature what you thought it would be? Will you be switching to the keyboard mode? Share with us in the comments below.
Don’t forget to check out the iOS 11 features for the list of 125+ features, and our iOS 11 category page for the comprehensive coverage of the upcoming update for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.
