How to Use Siri on Your iPhone

Siri is Apple's voice assistant, built into every iPhone and iPad. You can ask Siri to call people, send text messages, set alarms and timers, check the weather, play music, find directions, and answer questions — all without tapping anything on the screen. This is especially helpful when your hands are full or when fine motor control is tricky.

You can wake Siri up two ways. The hands-free way is to say "Hey Siri" or (on newer iPhones) just "Siri" out loud, and wait for the little animated swirl to appear at the bottom of the screen. The hands-on way is to press and hold the side button on the right edge of the iPhone until Siri appears.

The first time you set up your iPhone, you are asked to train Siri by saying a few phrases so she recognizes your voice. If you skipped this, you can turn it on later in Settings > Siri & Search > Listen for "Hey Siri." Training takes about 2 minutes.

Siri works best with simple, direct commands. "Call Mary." "Set a timer for 10 minutes." "What's the weather tomorrow?" "Remind me to take my pills at 8 PM." Longer, complicated sentences sometimes confuse her. If Siri does not understand, the screen shows what she thought you said — you can correct it by tapping and fixing the text.

Siri can also read your text messages and emails out loud when you have a Bluetooth headset in or are connected to your car. This makes catching up on messages while driving safer and easier. Ask "Read my latest messages" and she reads them to you, then asks if you want to reply.