The European Commission fined Alphabet's Google 890 million euros, or about $1 billion, Thursday for two violations of the Digital Markets Act, giving the company 60 days to change how it ranks its own services in Google Search and how it steers developers on the Google Play store.

The penalty is the third major DMA fine on a U.S. tech gatekeeper since this spring, when Brussels hit Apple and Meta for more than $700 million combined. Google can appeal, but the DMA's daily-fine mechanism means delay carries its own cost.

The breakdown

The commission split the penalty into 522 million euros for self-preferencing — showing Google's own shopping, hotel and flight results above rival services in Google Search — and 488 million euros for anti-steering practices that blocked Google Play developers from directing users to cheaper offers outside the store. Google must now treat third-party listings on a fair and non-discriminatory basis and allow developers to sign up users off-platform.

Teresa Ribera, the commission's executive vice president overseeing competition, said the decision restores fairness in European digital markets. “The best products should succeed because they’re better, not because they’re owned by the company running the search engine. And 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,” Ribera said.

Google's answer

Google President of Global Affairs Kent Walker called the fine "product degradation driven by a small group of self-serving complainants" and said compliance forces the company "to strip away real-time search features Europeans love — like instant pricing and direct availability for hotels, flights, and restaurants — and dismantle safety protections on Google Play." Walker said Google was considering an appeal. Alphabet, which reported $403 billion in revenue for 2025, lost a separate appeal earlier this year of a $4.5 billion EU fine over its Android mobile operating system.

Google has already rolled out changes to its Play steering terms and is testing revised presentations of shopping, hotel and flight results in Search, the commission said, and has volunteered to align its AI Overviews and AI Mode with the same rules.

Washington watching

Ahead of Thursday's decision, 25 Republican lawmakers wrote President Trump urging trade investigations against the EU, arguing the DMA has become a "tool of economic extraction and regulatory coercion against American firms." Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier responded that "the EU has the sovereign right to regulate economic activities on its territory."

The pushback

Google's substantive objection is that compliance strips real-time features European consumers use and that the DMA disproportionately burdens U.S. firms while sparing Chinese competitors like Temu and AliExpress from gatekeeper designation. Trump administration officials had not publicly responded to Thursday's fine by press time.

The 60-day compliance clock started Thursday. If Google misses it, the commission has said it can impose additional daily fines.