Google is finally making good on its settlement with Epic Games, rolling out lower developer fees and new payment options in select markets starting June 30.
The changes include a reduced commission structure and alternative billing options for app developers. A new 5% billing fee applies even to the base rate for publishers earning under $1 million. It’s a shift from the old 30% blanket commission that got Google in trouble in the first place.
Epic and Google spent years in a legal fight that went all the way to a jury finding Google’s Play Store practices anticompetitive. The settlement, announced earlier this year, was supposed to resolve that globally — short of the dramatic remedy of forcing Google to distribute third-party app stores.
Australia gets the new fee structure on September 30. Japan and Korea follow on December 31. Everyone else switches over on September 30, 2027.
Google is also updating its Games Level Up and Apps Experience programs, offering fee breaks in exchange for implementing more Play Store features. Those roll out in Europe, the UK, Australia, and the US on September 30.
Let’s be real: these changes help developers keep a bit more revenue, but Google still controls the Android software ecosystem and still takes a cut of every sale. The next phase of the settlement — requiring Google to certify third-party app stores — could be more consequential, but there’s no timeline for that yet.
