Screenshot of Apple CEO Tim Cook during the WWDC 2025 keynote. Image: TechnologyAdvice
Link-out fees collected from developers are a bargaining chip as Apple fights against the Digital Markets Act.
Apple will battle the European Commission in court to try to overturn a €500 million ($587 million) fine imposed by the commission in April, according to an appeal filed on Monday. At stake is the much-debated App Store ecosystem, which the commission said was in violation of the Digital Markets Act.
Specifically, the DMA states tech companies can’t block app makers from accepting payments through third-party services. The European Commission enforces EU laws, including the Digital Markets Act.
Apple’s App Store and its design to keep monetary transactions inside approved apps as much as possible has gotten the company in trouble before. Both lawmakers and companies with a significant financial stake in their mobile apps have protested it in court. For its part, Apple said the “walled garden” was a matter of safety and security, reducing breaches and scams, while allowing customers to control who has access to their data.
According to a Reuters report, Apple argued the fine and decision “go far beyond what the law requires.”
“Today we filed our appeal because we believe the European Commission’s decision — and their unprecedented fine — go far beyond what the law requires,” Apple said in a statement, according to Reuters.
“As our appeal will show, the EC is mandating how we run our store and forcing business terms which are confusing for developers and bad for users. We implemented this to avoid punitive daily fines and will share the facts with the court,” Apple said.
The EU has been seeking changes to the way Apple handles its App Store for years. The Digital Markets Act, a rule intended to promote competition and fairness, was enacted in September 2022. The large tech companies it applied to had until March 7, 2024, to comply. Not all did: Meta and Apple were both prioritized as problem companies in the summer of 2024.
Specifically, the European Commission said Apple discouraged app developers from steering customers outside of the app, charged hefty fees to the app makers, and allowed third-party purchases within apps only through cumbersome “link-outs.”
Apple made some changes by March 2024, including allowing third-party app stores and browser engines, while introducing the controversial Core Technology Fee for developers.
Those fees forced app developers to pass the cost on to their customers, the European Commission alleged.
The back-and-forth continued through April 2025, when the commission imposed the €500 million fine. In response, Apple changed the warnings it displayed to consumers when they tried to open external links in apps and restructured the link-out fees.
The daily fines Apple mentioned amount to 5% of its average daily worldwide revenue — or approximately €50 million per day.
Meanwhile, in the United States, Apple is fighting to prevent app makers from linking out to third-party storefronts in a different sense. In June, a court rejected Cupertino’s attempt to pause a ruling that stopped Apple from collecting certain App Store fees worldwide. In April, Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney wrote on Twitter, “Apple’s 15-30% junk fees are now just as dead here in the United States of America as they are in Europe under the Digital Markets Act. Unlawful here, unlawful there.”
Apple is reportedly reaching out to OpenAI or Anthropic to strengthen its AI offerings.
Fiona Jackson is a news writer who started her journalism career at SWNS press agency, later working at MailOnline, an advertising agency, and TechnologyAdvice. Her work spans human interest and consumer tech reporting, appearing in prominent media outlets such as TechHQ, The Independent, Daily Mail, and The Sun.
