U.S. Appeals Court Upholds Three-Year Ban: Restricting Google from Maintaining Play Store Advantage Through Interest Exchanges

On July 31, 2025, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (Appellate Court) panel rejected Google's appeal in the Play Store antitrust case and upheld the jury's 2023 ruling that “Google violated federal and state antitrust laws in the Android app distribution and built-in payment services markets.”

Epic Games (Epic) filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google for removing its Fortnite game, alleging that Google abused its dominant market position. The district court jury found that Google violated federal and California antitrust laws in the Android app distribution and in-app billing services markets by maintaining its monopoly through unfair means and illegally bundling the Play Store with the Google payment system.

The jury issued a three-year injunction prohibiting Google from maintaining the Play Store's advantage through exchange of interests and requiring it to allow developers to offer alternative payment channels. The injunction applies only within the United States and requires Google to complete the necessary reforms within eight months, with the three-year restriction period beginning after the reforms are completed.

The appeals court upheld the injunction, prohibiting Google from continuing its business strategy of restricting developers from directing users to use non-Google payment systems, which was deemed to be used to consolidate its market dominance. Google has applied for an emergency administrative stay of enforcement and emphasized that forcing it to comply within 14 days would “endanger 100 million US users and 500,000 developers and undermine the Android ecosystem.”

Google cited the 2021 Epic v. Apple case (where most of Epic's claims were dismissed) as a basis for its defense, arguing that Epic used a different market definition in its litigation with Apple and that the “estoppel” principle should apply. The appeals court ruled that Apple's “closed ecosystem” and Android's “open system” have fundamental differences, and that market definitions must be based on specific commercial realities, thus rejecting Google's argument.