Phil Schiller Steps Back from App Store Oversight
Phil Schiller, a longtime executive at Apple, has reportedly stepped away from his role managing the App Store. This decision seems to be influenced, at least in part, by his resistance to the company’s new leadership’s push for increased profitability from the platform.
At 66, Schiller has been a key figure during both the Steve Jobs and Tim Cook eras. After serving as the company’s marketing chief, he transitioned to becoming an Apple Fellow in 2020, while still overseeing the App Store and major product launches.
However, with the new CEO John Ternus and services manager Eddy Cue looking to boost revenue from the App Store, Schiller found himself at odds with their approach, as reported over the weekend.
Schiller believed that aggressive profit-driven tactics might worsen relationships with developers and regulatory bodies, according to the report.
While this disagreement didn’t escalate into a public dispute, it did lead Schiller to distance himself from the revenue-focused strategy.
The recent insights into Schiller’s exit from App Store management cast a new light on the business that generates over $30 billion annually and faces increasing scrutiny from both developers and regulators.
His concerns align with his previous objections regarding Apple’s commission practices during its legal battles, notably with Epic Games, the creator of “Fortnite.”
In 2023, he was against Apple’s proposal to impose a 27% commission on purchases made on developers’ websites following links from apps, according to court records.
He expressed internal frustrations with the commission model, asserting he was “not on team commission/fee.” This contrasted with the views of Apple’s CFO and other finance executives, who supported the commission, leading to the situation where Schiller testified that imposing these fees could harm developer relations.
Then-CEO Tim Cook ultimately sided with the finance team during a dispute over such commissions, a decision that later had negative repercussions for the company.
In April of last year, US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers ruled that Apple had failed to comply with an injunction from the Epic case, directly implicating Schiller as someone who advocated for the company’s adherence to judicial orders.
Rogers noted that Cook’s choice was a poor one in her ruling, emphasizing that siding with finance executives over Schiller was misjudged.
The judge found Apple in civil contempt, instructing the company to halt commission collections on external purchases and to cover legal fees incurred by Epic in relation to this contempt.
A federal appeals court upheld the contempt ruling in December 2025 but adjusted the penalties, allowing Apple the possibility to charge developers a fee based on legitimate expenses linked to facilitating external purchases.
This marked a notable change for Schiller, who had spent years defending Apple’s strict App Store regulations.
Back in 2020, he argued that the marketplace functions under “one set of rules for everybody” and justified Apple’s commission structure by pointing out the company’s contributions in areas like app distribution and security. Yet, he had expressed doubts about the percentage Apple took as early as 2011.
In an internal email revealed during the Epic litigation, Schiller had even considered whether the revenue split between developers and Apple should be revised, particularly if the App Store crossed the $1 billion profit threshold.
After he took charge of the App Store in 2015, Apple began implementing lower commission rates for various developers. For example, in 2016, the share on subscription revenue decreased from 30% to 15% once users had remained subscribed for more than a year. Additionally, a program was created to charge qualifying small developers a 15% commission.
Nonetheless, Schiller has maintained a rigorous enforcement attitude towards App Store regulations. The Post has reached out to Apple for comment.
