macOS 27 Beta Hides Trippy Siri 'Voice Pad' Interface With 13 Voices
Apple is reportedly developing a novel, immersive interface for selecting Siri's voice in macOS 27 Golden Gate. This new "voice pad" feature, discovered in the latest beta, replaces the traditional System Settings menu. The interface presents a dark canvas where selected voices are marked by colored dots. Users can interact with the pad by pressing and moving their pointer, triggering dynamic color transitions and voice modulations. The experience is further enhanced by spatial audio, making nearby voices clearer and distant ones ambient. A spatial mixer adjusts audio parameters based on cursor movement, affecting volume, reverb, and filtering. The pad's layout suggests support for up to thirteen custom Siri voices. While current betas lack the necessary voice models, related files describe thirteen expected American English voices with diverse characteristics. This interface represents a significant upgrade from the current single American voice option, which only allows for pace and expressivity adjustments via sliders. It appears to be an onboarding tool, with existing controls used for fine-tuning after initial selection. The immersive interface is expected to be localized for 44 languages and may also appear on iOS and iPadOS 27. Enabling this feature currently requires advanced technical steps involving disabling System Integrity Protection and using a debugger. This advanced Siri AI, powered by large language models, is set to launch in September with iOS 27 and macOS 27.