Top 5 iOS AI Shortcuts & Automations You Need to Try!

Have you ever found yourself struggling to read through a long article when you just need the key points, or wished you could quickly translate a foreign website without switching between multiple apps? Your iPhone can now handle these tasks and more through AI-powered shortcuts. Apple’s Shortcuts app has evolved to integrate with various AI services, turning your phone into a more intelligent assistant for everyday situations.

There are simple shortcuts you can set up once and use anywhere on your device – whether you need to translate documents, get local travel information, or interact with ChatGPT in new ways. Each shortcut takes tasks that normally require multiple steps or separate apps and reduces them to a single tap.

We’ve tested five practical AI shortcuts that address everyday challenges most iPhone users face. Some work better than others, and a few have limitations worth knowing about before you set them up. We’ll walk through what each one actually does, how well it performs in real use, and show you how to create your own AI shortcuts to fit your specific needs.

1. Summarize Articles and Webpages Instantly

This shortcut solves one of the most common problems when browsing online – information overload. When you come across a lengthy article but only need the main points, this shortcut extracts the essential content and sends it to ChatGPT for a quick summary. You can run it directly from Safari’s share sheet, which means you don’t need to leave the page you’re reading.

The shortcut pulls the article text using JavaScript to get the full content, then generates a summary that’s typically capped at around 120 words. Once you get the summary, you can copy it to your clipboard or save it to a note for later reference. The whole process takes about 10-15 seconds, which beats manually skimming through a 2,000-word article when you’re pressed for time.

This works well for news articles, blog posts, and research pieces where you need to quickly understand the core message. It’s particularly useful when you’re doing research and need to process multiple sources quickly. However, keep in mind that the quality of the summary depends on how well the shortcut can extract the article text – some websites with complex layouts might not work as smoothly as others.

2. Text AI

Text AI is essentially a mobile writing assistant that handles the basic editing tasks you’d normally do manually or with dedicated apps. It can proofread your text for grammar and spelling errors, change the writing style to make it more professional or casual, create summaries, or organize content into clear lists. You can access it from almost any place on your iPhone through the share sheet, which makes it convenient when you’re working across different apps.

The shortcut gives you four main options when you run it:

• Proofread – Fixes grammar and spelling mistakes
• Style changes – Converts text between professional, casual, or descriptive tones
• Summarize – Condenses longer text into key points
• List format – Organizes information into readable bullet points

This shortcut is very useful if you have an older iPhone that doesn’t support Apple Intelligence writing tools, since it provides similar functionality through AI. The processing is pretty fast, usually taking 5-10 seconds to return results. While it won’t replace professional editing for important documents, it’s useful for emails, messages, and casual writing where you want to clean up your text quickly before sending.

3. Immersive Translator

Immersive Translator is more capable than Safari’s basic translation feature because it gives you access to multiple AI translation engines like Gemini, DeepL, and ChatGPT. Instead of being limited to one translation service, you can choose from over 8 different options depending on what works best for the content you’re translating. The shortcut supports more than 20 languages and can handle entire web pages, images within those pages, and PDF documents.

The difference that separates it from built-in browser translation is how it preserves the original formatting and layout of whatever you’re translating. Regular translation tools often break the design of web pages or turn images into gray boxes, but Immersive Translator maintains the visual structure while providing the translated text.

The shortcut works well for students or professionals who regularly consume content in multiple languages. Since it’s integrated directly into iOS rather than requiring browser extensions, it runs smoothly across iPhone, iPad, and Mac. The main limitation is that some websites with strict security policies might limit how well it can extract content for translation, but this affects most translation tools similarly.

4. AI Tourist Guide

AI Tourist Guide attempts to solve a common problem with AI assistants – they often make up information about specific locations or give generic responses that don’t match your actual surroundings. This shortcut uses something called Retrieval Augmented Generation, which means it pulls real information from WikiVoyage before asking the AI to respond to your questions.

When you run the shortcut, it gets your current location and asks what you want to know about the area. Then it fetches relevant content from WikiVoyage and includes that information in the prompt it sends to the AI. This approach helps reduce the chances of getting completely fabricated recommendations or outdated information about local attractions, restaurants, or activities.

The shortcut is mostly used in two main scenarios:

• Getting information about your current location while traveling
• Planning ahead by asking about specific destinations you’re visiting

But after all, the quality of responses still depends on how much information WikiVoyage has about your specific location, and the shortcut can sometimes create prompts that are too long for smaller AI models to handle effectively. It’s most useful in well-documented tourist areas where WikiVoyage has comprehensive coverage.

5. ChatGPT Explore

ChatGPT Explore works as a central hub for different ways to interact with ChatGPT without having to open the main app each time. When you run the shortcut, you get a menu with five options: Fun for games and trivia, Chat for regular conversations, Compose for writing tasks, Voice Chat for spoken interactions, and Analyze Screen which takes a screenshot and lets you ask questions about what’s currently displayed.

The screen analysis feature is probably the most useful part since it can summarize what’s on your display, extract text from images, or answer questions about content you’re viewing. The voice chat works well for hands-free interactions, while the Fun section includes basic games like trivia that can be entertaining when you need a quick break. The Compose option helps with writing tasks, though it’s similar to what you’d get from the regular ChatGPT interface.

This shortcut is mainly about convenience rather than adding new functionality – it gives you access to ChatGPT features you could already use, just with fewer taps. The screen analysis is genuinely helpful for getting quick explanations of complex information or extracting text from images. However, since it redirects to ChatGPT anyway, you’re still dependent on having a good internet connection and the ChatGPT app.

Bonus: Node

Node is a more comprehensive AI assistant built entirely within the Shortcuts app, designed to handle productivity tasks that go past what Siri typically manages. Created by a developer who wanted something more capable for managing calendars, reminders, and notes, Node uses the Mistral API instead of redirecting to other apps, which makes it significantly faster than shortcuts that rely on ChatGPT’s interface. The system can dynamically choose between different AI models based on the complexity of your request.

Example use-cases of Node:

• Calendar and reminder management – Adding events and tasks with natural language
• Note-taking integration – Creating and organizing notes automatically
• Weather and screen analysis – Contextual information gathering
• Silent Run automation – Background tasks that run without user interaction

The Silent Run mode is interesting since it lets you set up automated workflows that run at specific times or locations. For example, you could have Node automatically summarize your daily schedule every morning or add events to your calendar when you receive certain emails. However, Node requires more setup than the other shortcuts we’ve covered, and since it’s a complex system built by one developer, it might occasionally break or need updates when iOS changes. It’s worth trying if you want a more comprehensive AI assistant, but expect a steeper learning curve.

How to Create Your Own AI iPhone Shortcut

Creating your own AI shortcut might sound technical, but it’s realtively straightforward once you understand the basic building blocks. This lets you customize exactly what you want your AI to do and how you want to interact with it, rather than being limited to what others have created.

Step 1: Prepare Your Setup

Make sure your iPhone is running iOS 18 or later, then open the built-in Shortcuts app. You’ll also need to decide which AI service you want to use – you can stick with Apple’s built-in AI features if you have a newer iPhone. Alternatively, you can set up a third-party service like the ChatGPT app or OpenAI’s API, which requires creating a free account and getting an API key.

Step 2: Create Your New Shortcut

Tap the plus button to start a new shortcut and give it a clear name that describes what it does. Think about whether you want this shortcut to work with text you select, images from your camera, or just as a standalone tool you can run anytime.

Step 3: Build the Input System

Add an “Ask for Input” action if you want users to type or speak their request, or use “Get Text from Input” if your shortcut will work on selected text. For more advanced shortcuts, you can add “Get Current Location” or “Take Screenshot” actions to give your AI more context about what you’re trying to do.

Step 4: Connect to Your AI Service

This is where you add the AI functionality. If you’re using Apple Intelligence, look for actions like “Summarize Text” or “Rewrite Text”. For third-party services, you’ll need to add a “Get Contents of URL” action and configure it to send your text to the AI’s API endpoint with your API key. Basically, this action lets your shortcut communicate with external AI services over the internet – you’re sending your text to their servers and getting the AI’s response back.

Step 5: Handle the Response

Add actions to process what the AI sends back. Usually this means extracting the text from the response and then either showing it to the user with “Show Result,” copying it to the clipboard, or saving it to a note. You might also want to add error handling in case the AI service is unavailable.

Step 6: Test and Refine

Run your shortcut several times with different inputs to make sure it works reliably. Pay attention to how long it takes to respond and whether the AI gives you the kind of answers you’re looking for. You can always go back and adjust the prompts or add more actions to improve the results.

Step 7: Make It Accessible

Once your shortcut works well, you can add it to your home screen, set up voice activation through Siri, or enable it in the share sheet so you can use it from other apps. Consider setting up automations if you want the shortcut to run automatically based on time, location, or other triggers.

Conclusion

AI-powered shortcuts are opening up some really interesting possibilities for creating useful time-savers and workflow improvements on iPhone. People are building clever solutions that handle everything from automatic email processing to location-based reminders, and many of these shortcuts genuinely make daily tasks more efficient.

The shortcuts we covered today are just a starting point for what’s possible when you combine AI with iPhone automation. Whether you need quick article summaries, better translation tools, or a more capable writing assistant, there’s likely a shortcut that can help streamline those tasks. Each one we tested has its strengths and limitations, but they all demonstrate how AI can handle routine work.

If none of these shortcuts fit your specific needs, the step-by-step guide should give you enough foundation to build something custom. Start with a simple idea, test it thoroughly, and don’t be afraid to iterate until it works the way you want. The tools are accessible enough that you don’t need programming experience, just patience to work through the setup process and refine your automation over time.