Open-source project lets an AI drive a real iPhone with a $7 ESP32 board

A new open-source project, esp32-iphone-agent, lets an AI model operate a real iPhone with no Mac, Apple developer account or jailbreak. The MIT-licensed project uses AirPlay screen mirroring as the AI's "eyes" and a roughly $7 ESP32-S3 board plugged into the phone's USB port as its "hands", appearing as a standard USB mouse and keyboard. Any OpenAI-compatible vision model can be the brain, including one you run yourself. A planner model writes a plan from the goal and screen, and an actor model picks each tap, swipe or keystroke; it checks whether the screen changed after each action and retries missed taps. The README demos it drawing a smiley face and setting a repeating alarm. This is an early hobbyist project. It needs a computer on the same network running UxPlay. The README lists its limitations: iOS does not mirror some screens, such as passcode entry, Apple Pay and DRM video, so the agent cannot see them; mirroring stops when the phone locks; keyboard input is ASCII only; and landscape apps are not supported yet.