iOS 18.1 Beta Now Offers Notification Summaries for All Apps

With the third beta of iOS 18.1, Apple has introduced new Apple Intelligence features for notifications. The notification summarization option that was previously available for the Mail and Messages apps now works with all of your apps.

summarize notification previews
After updating to the latest beta, there is an ‌Apple Intelligence‌ setup flow that walks through some of the new features and includes settings for the Summarize Notification Previews section.

During setup, you can opt to summarize all of your notification previews or choose which apps should use the summarization feature. After setup, these preferences can be tweaked in the Summarize Previews of the Settings app under the Notifications heading.

Notification summarization allows ‌Apple Intelligence‌ to glean key details from groups of notifications from an app, making them more succinct so you can see what's important at a glance. From the Settings app:

Summarize content in direct messages and groups of notifications making them more succinct and easier to read. Summary accuracy may vary based on content.

There are individual toggles to enable or disable summarization on a per-app basis, and it can also be entirely disabled for those who do not want to use the feature.

You will see notification summaries on the Lock Screen, and it is a feature that pairs well with the new Reduce Interruptions Focus Mode.

As with other ‌Apple Intelligence‌ features, notification summarization requires a device that can run ‌Apple Intelligence‌, aka the iPhone 15 Pro models or an iPad or Mac with an M-series chip. The functionality is limited to developers who have installed the third beta of iOS 18.1 at the current time, but ‌Apple Intelligence‌ will see a public release later this year.

Today's beta also adds the Clean Up object removal tool to the Photos app.

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Top Rated Comments

Motawa Avatar
9 months ago

so instead of "reading" 6 notifications,you have read 2, i wouldn't pay for this "feature".
Nobody asking you to pay for this, what are you talking about.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
surferfb Avatar
9 months ago

As someone who absolutely despises notifications, and doesn't have them enabled for anything other than calls and messages....we'll see.

I'm not disregarding the idea just yet!
I recently installed the beta on my main device, and was on a three hour drive yesterday where I couldn't check my phone. Apple AI successfully summarized an 11-message group iMessage thread into a short sentence that was a completely accurate summary. I was shocked at how well it worked and how useful it was. Hopefully it works just as well on longer group chat threads, but color me surprisingly impressed.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
jarman92 Avatar
9 months ago
Working pretty well so far! This one accurately summarizes the previous 3 NYT alerts.

Attachment Image
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
IceCool Avatar
9 months ago

so basically apple couldn’t figure out to show us notifications and instead will use chatgpt

jesus christ i miss my android sometimes
Apple Intelligence isn't ChatGPT... At all.

The only area ChatGPT and Apple Intelligence connect is in Siri's ChatGPT integration. And in that regard Siri is not being powered by ChatGPT behind the scenes. Siri is only being given the ability - at the end-users discretion - to refer to ChatGPT when it fails to produce a result for the most demanding queries. And honestly, most people probably won't ever need it assuming Apple Intelligence Siri is as smart as most people are anticipating.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
DavidLeblond Avatar
9 months ago
I want Eufy Security to just say "Yeah, I think your wife is watering the front lawn. I'll mute myself for an hour, no need to worry."
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Motawa Avatar
9 months ago
Does this help for people spamming messages to me? It’s annoying getting notifications from certain friends like 5 in a row in 10 seconds
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)