Apple added Japanese language support to Siri last week with the release of iOS 5.1, but some Japanese speakers are having trouble being understood by the voice assistant.

A video posted to YouTube shows a man performing a side-by-side Japanese comprehension comparison of Apple's Siri and DoCoMo's own voice-recognition feature Syabette Concier, as noted by Kotaku. Siri was able to understand basic commands, but it had difficulty registering more advanced requests.

For instance, when asked, "Is it cold outside?," both Siri and Syabette Concier provided weather data. When the speaker said, "I have a stomach ache," Siri did not understand, while Syabette offered information on the nearest hospital.

A request for tomorrow's schedule was accurately responded to by Syabette, but Siri only understood the schedule part. Siri was unable to provide a map of Chigasaki because it is limited in the location data that it can call up outside the U.S. As a local Japanese solution, Syabette easily accessed the map.

Siri was also unable to handle a search for videos of a Japanese pop singer with a gibberish name, while Syabette had no problem with it. "Seems like Siri can only comprehend simple and universal Japanese," the report noted.

According to the report, Apple's virtual assistant was able to set an alarm, but it faltered on a tongue twister and a statement about cooking curry. Loading times were also longer on average for Siri than for Docomo's version.

How do you think about Siri Japanese experience?

via appleinsider