It sure looks like AI-powered search is coming to Safari

AI-based search options may be coming to Safari across Apple’s platforms.

At least, that’s what Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior VP of services, testified in the Justice Department’s lawsuit against Alphabet Inc. The lawsuit is over Google’s monopoly over search and whether it broke antitrust law. One of the ways it was said to have done this is by paying Apple to maintain its position as the default search engine in Safari (realistically, the only web browser for over a billion iPhone users).

Last year, the court found Google to be acting as a monopolist, claiming it “has acted as one to maintain its monopoly. It has violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act.” Now, Google is in court again to discuss exactly what the remedy should be—will Alphabet/Google’s properties be broken apart? If so, how?

In his court appearance, Eddy Cue remarked on the Safari search deal with Google and where things are headed, according to a report from Bloomberg. Cue said Apple is “actively looking at” changing the way search works in Safari to focus on AI-powered search engines. Searches actually dipped on Safari last month for the first time, he said, which he attributed to people getting their answers from AI. Cue said he believes AI-based search products like those from Perplexity, Anthropic, and OpenAI will eventually replace the standard search one gets from Google. He expects to add those as search providers to Safari in the future, adding, “We will add them to the list — they probably won’t be the default.”

Cue said the products still need to improve before that happens, however. He said making Google the default search was a natural choice because the other search engines were valid choices. “I think today there is much greater potential because there are new entrants attacking the problem in a different way,” he added.

Meanwhile, Google is moving ahead rapidly to incorporate AI into its search results and will soon debut a new “AI mode” for its search. In general, it seems that the public dislikes AI stuff inserted into search results, and the only feedback we see is that “Google is ruining search” and that more people just get answers to things they need from social media, instead.

Google had a chance to be the AI partner for Apple Intelligence in iOS 18, instead of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. There was a “bake-off” between the two, but Google’s term sheet, he says, “had a lot of things Apple wouldn’t agree to and didn’t agree to with OpenAI.” Google is widely rumored to become an option for extended AI features in iOS 19, providing users with a choice between ChatGPT, Gemini, and perhaps others.

The following paragraph of Bloomberg’s story is illuminating:

Still, [Cue] believes Google should remain the default in Safari, saying that he has lost sleep over the possibility of losing the revenue share from their agreement. He said Apple’s agreement with Google today on regular search still has the best financial terms.

This description of the proceedings makes it sound like Cue believes AI search, while not good enough right now, is the future and will soon be better for most users. But the billions of dollars Google pays to be the default is too good to give up.