How-To
iOS 27 turns iPhone Shortcuts into a useful assistant
Apple’s iOS 27 beta lets users describe Shortcuts automations in plain language. Here are seven practical ideas for everyday iPhone tasks.
Apple’s Shortcuts app has long offered powerful automation, but building a useful workflow often required learning its scripting-style interface. iOS 27 changes that with a feature called Describe a Short, which uses Apple Intelligence to turn a plain-language request into an automation flow. Wired reports that the feature made Shortcuts substantially easier to use while testing the iOS 27 beta.
When iOS 27 arrives in fall 2026, users will be able to tell Shortcuts what they want an automation to do, then refine the result with follow-up prompts inside the app. Manual scripting remains available for advanced users. The beta can still produce imperfect automations, but the feature supports workflows that go beyond opening an app or running a simple timer.
Seven iPhone automations to try
The examples cover several kinds of Shortcuts triggers: opening an app, reaching a location, taking a screenshot, changing a device state, recognizing a sound, and running at a scheduled time. Describe a Short’s main change is that users can request these chains conversationally rather than assembling every action manually.
Because these workflows were built with an iOS 27 beta, they are not guaranteed to generate perfectly. The app still allows users to edit the resulting flow or fall back to manual scripting, and Apple has not said in the supplied report whether every example will behave identically in the final release. But the beta already makes Shortcuts approachable for tasks that previously demanded more patience than most iPhone owners wanted to spend.