The Google logo outside its offices in London on June 24, 2025. Carlos Jasso/Reuters
Google on Thursday agreed to pay $353 million to settle a class-action lawsuit brought on behalf of British developers who sold apps through the Google Play Store in the UK.
Lawyers for academic Barry Rodger, who led the case, alleged that the tech giant had abused its dominant position in the Android app distribution market by preventing others from competing in distribution services and charging developers an “excessive and unfair” commission rate of up to 30 percent.
The 19-page settlement agreement between Rodger’s and Google’s lawyers states that Google “believes it has strong defences to Professor Rodger’s claim.” Google made no admission of liability or wrongdoing.
Under the deal, which still requires approval by London’s Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT), 160 million pounds ($217.3 million) will be made available to app developers who sold an app on the Play Store between August 2018 and August 2026, and a further 100 million pounds ($136 million) will be released by Google to pay the legal costs of bringing the lawsuit, according to Rodger’s Aug. 25 witness statement.
CAT is due to rule on the agreement at a Sept. 15 hearing.
A Google spokesperson told The Epoch Times that the company was pleased to reach an agreement with the developers, adding that it remains committed to supporting the UK developer community.
Rodger said that if the settlement is approved, “meaningful financial compensation will become available for businesses that could never have taken on a company like Google alone.”
The Epoch Times reached out to Rodger for further comment but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
The settlement comes at a time of increased scrutiny of the California company by UK authorities.
The UK’s competition regulator, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), ordered Google on June 17 to provide greater transparency on how its search rankings work, as part of its drive to secure a “fairer deal” for businesses.
People pass a building on the Google headquarters campus in Mountain View, Calif., on July 23, 2025. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
According to the new rules, Google must rank organic search results using objective criteria, increase transparency around rankings, introduce clearer complaint processes, and allow users to transfer their search data to authorized third parties.
The CMA had assigned “strategic market status” to Google, which receives more than 90 percent of search queries made in the UK. That status allows the CMA to set targeted rules to increase transparency.
A Google spokesperson told The Epoch Times at the time that its ranking systems are “fair, transparent, and show the most relevant, highest quality results,” adding it will “work constructively with the CMA to ensure that we can uphold the high quality of Search for our users.”
Reuters contributed to this report.
