Judge rules Google must open Android app store to competitors

A federal judge ruled Monday that Google must launch the Play Store to compete with third-party Android app stores.

U.S. District Judge James Donato ordered the tech giant to allow third-party app stores and platforms to be distributed through its Android app store for three years.

The ruling marks a significant victory for Epic Games, which sued Google four years ago for protecting the Play Store from competition.

The Fortnite maker already won a major victory in December when a San Francisco jury found that Google violated antitrust laws by erecting anticompetitive barriers to protect its app store.

“Big News! Thanks to the Epic vs. Google win, the Epic Games Store and other app stores will be coming to the US Google Play Store in 2025 without Google’s scary screen or Google’s 30% app tax. ,” Epic founder and CEO Tim Sweeney wrote in an article. Post to X.

The ruling also requires Google to open its Play Store app catalog to third-party Android app stores and allow in-app payment methods other than Google Play Billing.

Google may also tie payments and access to its products and services to agreements with app developers and device manufacturers, allowing them to launch apps exclusively through the Play Store or pre-install the app store on devices. Prohibited.

LeeAnne Mulholland, Google's vice president of regulation, said in a blog post Monday that the tech giant plans to appeal the decision.

“The Epic decision missed the obvious point: Apple and Android are clearly competitors,” she said. “We will appeal and ask the court to suspend implementation of the remedies in order to maintain a consistent and secure experience for users and developers as the legal process progresses.”

Mulholland also pointed to a contrary ruling in the Epic v. Apple case. In 2021, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers ruled that the Fortnite maker had failed to prove that Apple was an illegal monopolist.

But she also found that the iPhone maker engaged in illegal anti-competitive conduct regarding its App Store practices and ordered the company to allow other forms of in-app purchases.