You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

💡 Did you know?

⏺ If you can't accept iCloud Terms and Conditions... Learn more >

⏺ If you don't see your iCloud notes in the Notes app... Learn more >

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

Enable Siri on iPhone 5S?

I've never used Siri for privacy reasons, but now I seem to need it to get my new car to play from my phone.


I have an iPhone5S, and every article or tutorial I see shows things that don't work:

-holding the home button does not show any voice activation 'soundwave' screen view

-under Settings > General > Accessibility there is no 'Siri' setting/line/option I can see


I know I've done my best to not use Siri, and if there was a past option to disable it, I might have clicked on whatever option to disable it.....but I haven't seen or thought about such a setting in several iterations of iOS.


So...how do I get Siri back?


Is it possible I might have to reset the phone as new to recover Siri, if it was turned off back in iOS 7 or 8 or 9 or whatever?




iPhone 5s

Posted on Apr 29, 2019 8:29 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Apr 29, 2019 9:01 PM

Check that restrictions aren't on for Siri

If you can't turn on Siri on your iOS device or Mac, make sure that you haven't disabled Siri in Restrictions.


  • On iOS 12 or later, go to Settings > Screen Time > Content
  • & Privacy Restrictions > Allowed Apps and make sure that Siri
  • & Dictation isn't turned off. On iOS 11 or earlier, go to Settings
  • > General > Restrictions.


This was the key, thank you.

3 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Apr 29, 2019 9:01 PM in response to sberman

Check that restrictions aren't on for Siri

If you can't turn on Siri on your iOS device or Mac, make sure that you haven't disabled Siri in Restrictions.


  • On iOS 12 or later, go to Settings > Screen Time > Content
  • & Privacy Restrictions > Allowed Apps and make sure that Siri
  • & Dictation isn't turned off. On iOS 11 or earlier, go to Settings
  • > General > Restrictions.


This was the key, thank you.

Enable Siri on iPhone 5S?

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.