Apple is exploring a revamp of its Safari browser, emphasizing AI-driven search engines, as its Google partnership faces potential disruption and industry trends evolve.
Apple Inc. is “actively looking at” reshaping the Safari web browser on its devices to focus on AI-powered search engines in light of the potential collapse of its Google deal and broader industry shifts.
Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of services, made the disclosure Wednesday during his testimony in the US Justice Department’s lawsuit against Alphabet Inc. The heart of the dispute is Apple and Google’s estimated $20 billion-a-year deal that makes Google the default offering for queries in Apple’s included browser.
He also noted that searches on Safari dipped for the first time last month, which he attributed to people using AI. Cue said he believes that AI search providers, including OpenAI, Perplexity AI Inc. and Anthropic PBC, will eventually replace standard search engines like Google. He said he believes Apple will add those players as options in Safari in the future.
Right now, Apple offers OpenAI’s ChatGPT as an option in Siri and is expected to add Gemini, Google’s AI search product, later this year. Cue said Apple also looked at Anthropic, Perplexity, DeepSeek, and Grok for this purpose.
MacDailyNews Take: We no longer search with Google as its results do not reflect the depth of the entire web, and skewed by bias, and are laden with paid placements. Google is passé.
For far, far better search results than Google, we use Grok 3 either in Safari via x.com/i/grok or in the Grok app for iPhone and iPad.
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