Honor's next-gen YOYO AI assistant leaks — app control, long-term memory, and custom models

Honor is overhauling its YOYO AI assistant. Leaked images posted by Chinese tipsters this week show what appears to be a substantially upgraded version called YOYO Next — and it goes far beyond the usual voice-command refresh.

The leak, shared by leaker @数码闲聊站, ties YOYO Next to the upcoming MagicOS 11 update. The assistant will ship with something called “YOYO Claw” — presumably a new action engine — and will support custom AI large language models, letting users plug in their model of choice rather than relying on a single built-in system. That alone sets it apart from most phone assistants today.

A second leak from @旺仔百事通 laid out a side-by-side comparison of the current YOYO and YOYO Next. The new version adds several capabilities the old one lacks: full app control (the current YOYO only manages this in limited scenarios), complex multi-step task execution, long-term memory that remembers user preferences across sessions, and a skill store for downloading new capabilities. There’s also support for custom AI models, which opens up the possibility of specialized assistants tuned for specific use cases.

YOYO has been Honor’s AI voice assistant for years, but it gained serious credibility in April when it became the first Android-native AI agent to integrate DeepSeek-V4, the latest iteration of the Chinese AI lab’s large language model. That move signaled Honor was investing in AI capabilities beyond the typical weather-and-alarms assistant. YOYO Next doubles down on that bet, positioning itself closer to what Apple and Google are aiming for with their own agentic AI efforts.

And then there’s the shrimp thing. At the Magic V6 launch in March, Honor’s product manager Han Enze announced what he called the “Lobster Universe” — a three-pronged initiative involving YOYO Shrimp Control, Ecological Shrimp Farming, and Safe Shrimp Farming. The shrimp farming skills appear again in the YOYO Next leak. No, this is not a joke — Honor actually built AI-powered shrimp-farming capabilities into its voice assistant. Whether anyone will use a phone assistant to manage crustacean agriculture remains to be seen, but it’s certainly the most unexpected feature of any 2026 AI update.

YOYO Next is expected to debut alongside MagicOS 11, likely later this year.