iPhone 4S Siri features missing for UK owners

Share

siri-problem.JPG
Manage to get an iPhone 4S this morning? Having fun asking Siri questions that wouldn’t be out of place in 2001: A Space Odyssey? Well cherish those initial moments of joy UK tech fans; we’ve got some bad news for you. Tech Digest have been hands-on with the iPhone 4S all morning, and noticed a few features missing from Siri on UK shores.

Firstly, if you’re hoping that your new voice activated assistant will help you navigate the streets of old Blighty, you’re out of luck. Navigation features are not programmed into the UK version of Siri (at least not yet) meaning you’re going to have to map out routes manually. In the US, Siri is able to handle all your navigation requests.

Likewise, if you’re looking to ask Siri for information on local businesses (say to order a pizza, or find the nearest chemist) you wont be able to do that using voice commands either. Apple have failed to secure a UK business look-up partner, meaning again it’s time to hit Google for your search answers. Again, in the US you’re able to carry out these tasks, with the Siri search partner being Yell.

Hopefully Apple will put these missing features in place sooner rather than later, as our experience with Siri’s voice recognition capabilities on the whole has been very good.

But if they don’t, what does that mean for the iPhone 4S? Siri is the smartphone’s headline feature in its fully functional state. If it’s hamstrung in the UK by a lack of search partners, does that make you less likely to upgrade to Apple’s revamped iPhone?

Let us know in the comments section below.

Gerald Lynch

9 comments

  • Love it even without all it’s features it’s pretty damn good, at the end of the day it’s an American product. Much as odd person complains apple won’t ship till they are sure it works ,I have windows

  • Overall, I love my iphone 4S but I am disapointed that Siri can not do all that it does in the US. I am sure Apple will deal with this problem eventually, but I hope its soon and not later. Siri has shown to me it is a great app, but it needs to do more in the UK.

  • This is a joke. Navigation and business lookup missing. Apple ripping of users not residing in USA. Where was the ‘Oh and by the way, Siri isn’t available in the UK’ in the keynote and release for the UK market.

    SORT IT APPLE FFS.

  • Voice search for local supermarkets, restaturants etc works great on Windows Phone 7 Mango. I was pleasantly surpised!!!

  • I received my iPhone 4S today and was surprised at how well SIRI worked even without the features mentioned in this article. Hopefully they will have the navigation features in soon.

Comments are closed.