Epic Games gains partial victory over Apple and Google in Australia

Australia has ruled that Apple's App Store and Google's Play Store are uncompetitive, leading Epic Games to declare victory in its years-long legal case, and announce that 'Fortnite' will return to iOS in the country.The case in Australia has been practically a mirror image of the Epic Games vs Apple suit in the US, to the extent that Australian courts suspended it until the American version reached a conclusion. Having originally been filed in 2020, the case accusing both Apple and Google of anticompetitive behavior resumed in 2024 and has now reached an initial judgement.The Epic Games Store and Fortnite will come to iOS in Australia! An Australian court just found that Apple and Google abuse their control over app distribution and in-app payments to limit competition. There are 2,000+ pages of findings that we'll need to dig into to fully— Epic Games Newsroom (@EpicNewsroom) August 12, 2025 According to ABC News Australia, the ruling runs to 2,000 pages, but only a summary version has been publicly released so far. In it, Australia's federal court said that it found both Apple's and Google's app stores had no protection against anti-competitive behavior.It notes, though, that this is not the same as finding that these companies had intentionally broken the law. Judge Jonathan Beach ruled that the two had misused their market power, however, saying that they had 'engaged in conduct... that had the purpose or is likely to have or had the effect of substantially lessening competition.' Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums