Google has moved to end a bruising antitrust fight with Epic Games by proposing a set of changes to Android’s Play Store fee structure and payment options, according to court filings made in San Francisco. The company’s proposal would reduce baseline commissions on Play Store subscriptions and e-commerce transactions, while also creating a certification pathway that would let rival app options operate without relying on a more disruptive overhaul ordered by the court.
The settlement terms, filed Wednesday, follow a long case that began in August 2020 when video game maker Epic Games sued to make it easier for alternative payment options to compete against Google’s Play Store system. Epic’s case targeted the fees Google charges on in-app transactions, which had ranged from 15% to 30% depending on the circumstances, according to the Associated Press account of the dispute.
Under the revisions, Google says it would decrease its baseline commissions worldwide into the 10% to 20% range. For apps that prefer to process payments entirely through the Play Store, Google also is offering an optional additional 5% payment processing charge that would sit on top of other service fees.
Google said it will still allow developers to choose payment processing systems outside Google. For consumers, the proposal would allow apps distributed through alternative app stores that complete a Google certification process. Although those alternative stores would not be required to use Google’s registration, the AP report said stores that go through Google’s registration process would be less likely to trigger security warnings.
The proposed registration process still depends on approval from U.S. District Judge James Donato, who must sign off on it as an alternative to the more extensive overhaul he ordered in October 2024. Google, according to the filing description, is already planning to move ahead with the revised approach with a rollout that it intends to begin in the United States, the United Kingdom, and the European Union.
Google is seeking an April 9 hearing before Donato to answer questions about the revisions, which are described as being backed by Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney. Sweeney told the Associated Press that Epic has been advocating for open platforms for a long time and that the proposed changes would bring Android “up to the status of a truly open platform.” Sameer Samat, Google’s executive in charge of Android, said in the interview that Google wants “to focus more energy and time on building than on quarreling” and described the settlement as a truce after years of acrimony.
The AP report also framed the lower fees as a potential hit to Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company, even as it noted that Alphabet’s market value had grown significantly since Epic filed its lawsuit. The report placed the Play Store settlement alongside other antitrust matters involving Google, including a separate ruling tied to search and data sharing and another case involving portions of its digital advertising technology that a Virginia judge is weighing for possible breakup.
The Play Store case was launched by Epic as a parallel to a similar dispute with Apple over its iPhone app store, where Epic said changes ordered by a federal judge had not been enough to allow alternative payment options to function as requested. For now, Sweeney indicated he plans to focus on the outcome of the Play Store settlement, saying, as the AP report quoted him, “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try, you can often get what you need,” adding that “what we need is competition.”