EU fines Google €890m in first Digital Markets Act penalty

By Simon Wu · 2026-07-26

Two fines, one day, one historic ruling

The European Commission handed Google two separate infringement decisions on 23 July 2026, together carrying a total penalty of €890 million, the first fines ever issued under the Digital Markets ActverifiedVerified Source: ec.europa.eu.^[1] The penalties arrive nearly three years after the DMA entered into force in September 2022 and mark a clear shift from the Commission's earlier posture of negotiation and guidance toward hard enforcement.

Teresa Ribera, the Commission's Executive Vice-President for Clean, Just and Competitive Transition, said the best products should succeed because they are better, not because they are owned by the company running the search engine, and that European consumers have a right to be told by app developers where to sign up to the best offers, even when the app store owner does not get a cut.^[1]

How the DMA put Google in the crosshairs

Google was formally designated as a gatekeeper for its online search engine in September 2023. The Commission opened non-compliance investigations on 25 March 2024, targeting two specific behaviours: the way Google ranked its own products within Search, and the contractual restrictions it placed on developers distributing apps through Google Play.^[1]

Under the DMA, designated gatekeepers must not treat their own services more favourably in ranking than third-party services, and must apply transparent, fair and non-discriminatory conditions to such ranking.^[1] The law sets fines of up to 10 per cent of a gatekeeper's total worldwide turnover for a single breach, with periodic penalties layered on top if a company drags its feet on compliance.

The search self-preferencing breach: €460 million

The Commission found that Google gave its own services, including shopping, hotels, transport and sports, more prominent placement in search results, using top-of-page positions and enhanced visuals and filters unavailable to third-party rivalsverifiedVerified Source: ec.europa.eu.^[1] That structural advantage, not product merit, is what the Commission says tipped traffic toward Google's own properties.

Henna Virkkunen, Executive Vice-President for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy, said the Commission found Google harms businesses offering similar services, such as shopping or sports, by not granting them the same level of prominence on Google Search.^[1] The €460 million penalty attached to this breach is the larger of the two, reflecting the scale of organic traffic at stake across the EU.

What a redesigned search page could look like

The Commission's remedial order requires Google to treat third-party services in search results on a fair and non-discriminatory basis.^[1] In practice, that could mean stripping the dedicated visual boxes, the hotel carousels, flight price panels and sports score widgets, of their current top-of-page privilege, or opening the same enhanced placement to comparable third-party services on equal terms.

Either path would materially alter the search results page that billions of users see. Businesses that currently sit beneath Google's own product units, including Australian hotel booking platforms, travel aggregators and comparison sites, would find their organic visibility affected, for better or worse, depending on how Google engineers the fix. The 60-day compliance window means any redesign would need to be live before late September 2026.^[1]

The Play Store anti-steering breach: €430 million

Google was found to have prevented app developers distributing through Google Play from communicating or promoting offers available outside the store, including cheaper prices, in breach of the DMA's anti-steering rulesverifiedVerified Source: ec.europa.eu.^[1] The €430 million fine sits alongside an order to allow developers to freely direct users to off-store deals going forward.

Virkkunen said Google has restricted app developers from offering cheaper deals to customers in the Google Play app store, and that Google must now bring the non-compliance to an end and refrain from continuing it in the future.^[1] For developers who sell subscriptions or digital goods, the ability to point users to a cheaper web-based checkout, bypassing Google's standard commission, is a considerable commercial shift.

Why Australian businesses are watching Brussels

EU regulatory decisions have a long record of influencing platform behaviour worldwide. Google does not run separate algorithmic architectures for different jurisdictions, and any structural concession forced by Brussels tends to surface, at least partially, in how the platform behaves elsewhere. Australian travel, hospitality and comparison-site operators who compete for search visibility against Google's native product units have a direct interest in how the remedial design unfolds.

Ribera described the decisions as decisive yet balanced enforcement action and said the DMA's promise is to protect fairness, choice and innovation in digital markets for the benefit of all European citizens.^[1] Virkkunen said today's decisions send a clear message that the Commission will not hesitate to use its tools to safeguard business and innovation opportunities opened up by the DMA.^[1] Google's 60-day compliance deadline falls in late September 2026, with periodic penalty payments of up to 5 per cent of total worldwide annual turnover triggered if either breach continues beyond that date.

Simon Wu

Simon Wu writes about Asia-Pacific markets and China's economy. He reads the Chinese-language financial press closely and looks for the stories that reach Australia before anyone here notices.