Ever since Siri was launched, we have hoped that Apple would open up the virtual assistant to third-party developers, and let them develop apps taking advantage of a Siri API.
While we haven’t seen a Siri API till now, there are some signs of third-party integration in Siri with iOS 8. When asked to “Start classical music radio”, in addition to the default Music app, Siri also shows Spotify as an option. This was discovered by reddit user unixunderground. The user notes that he or she wanted to open an iTunes Radio station, and on tapping Spotify, nothing happened. Another user adds that a similar search on their iPhone returns TuneIn and EarBits in results, but tapping on either of those results simply launches the app.
While we can take this to be a hint at the release of a long-requested Siri API, it’s probably something to do with the way music is played on CarPlay systems and possibly the Apple Watch.
Have you seen multiple options when trying to play music via Siri? Let us know in the comments below.
[via reddit]