You can get Siri to read out your update on iPhone, HomePod, and HomePod mini. Just ask Siri “What’s my update?”
The exact response from Siri will vary based on what it thinks is relevant to you at a particular moment. The Personal Update can include information about the weather, upcoming calendar events, travel time to locations Siri knows you will be visiting today, any upcoming reminders, followed by a regional news update.
If some of those categories don’t apply, your update will naturally be shorter. For instance, for me, there’s nothing on my calendar so my update currently comprises the weather and the news bulletin. You can ask for your update throughout the day and its content will change as appropriate.
The news segment is like a mini-audio podcast, about two to three minutes in length, from sources like NPR, CNN and the BBC. This is the same as what you get if you ask Siri to read the news directly. This part of the update can be optionally disabled if you don’t find it useful (to do this ask Siri, ‘remove the news from my update’).
Personal Update uses the Personal Requests mechanism of HomePod. This means your iPhone must be on the same network in order for the HomePod to respond, as the request is relayed through the phone. This also means the request is personalised to your user account, so it works with the HomePod multi-user features.
The Siri daily update feature was first announced at the Apple October event, as part of the HomePod mini unveiling. iOS 14.2 also includes the highly-anticipated Intercom functionality. The $99 HomePod mini goes up for pre-order tomorrow, with units shipping from November 16th.
