Apple replaces EU Core Technology Fee with 5% commission

Apple's newsroom announcement says the new EU business terms take effect October 1, and every EU developer moves onto a single fee schedule.

"Following close collaboration with the European Commission, Apple announced changes to its business terms for apps in the EU," the company wrote, describing the deal as resolving "Apple's disagreements with the Commission over business terms and alternative distribution."

The tiers land at 26 percent for apps using Apple In-App Purchase, 20 percent for alternative payment processing, and 15 percent for apps that link out to the web. Small Business Program participants, Mini Apps Partner Program, Video Partner Program, and auto-renewing subscriptions after year one drop to 15 percent inside the App Store, or 10 percent at the two lower tiers.

The bigger change sits outside the App Store. "The Core Technology Fee, a per-install fee for developers that achieve extraordinary scale, will be replaced by the Core Technology Commission, a simple 5 percent commission on digital transactions in apps distributed outside the App Store." Alternative marketplaces and web-distributed apps pay that same 5 percent, and every alternatively distributed app still has to pass Apple's Notarization review.

According to BigGo Finance, "the Commission said it welcomed Apple's changes and will monitor their implementation." Non-compliance still exposes DMA-covered companies to fines of up to 10 percent of global revenue. It fits a stretch of Apple regulator stories we have tracked, including Beijing's clearance last week of Apple's Alibaba-trained China LLM.

Kids category apps cannot include website transaction links, users under 13 are blocked from web-based transactions entirely, and under-18s need a parental gate before using alternative payments. Developers who pick a payment method must keep it in place for 12 months.