Google Play's 10% fee and billing choice: what June 2026 means for your studio

Direct answer — how much does Google Play actually take under the June 2026 Billing Choice Program? Since June 30, 2026, Google Play charges a 10% service fee on your first $1M of annual earnings in the EEA, UK and US — regardless of which billing system you use. Above $1M, the standard rate is 20% on new-install transactions and 25% on existing installs, dropping to 15%/20% if you enrol in the Games Level Up program. If you use Google Play’s own billing rails there’s an additional 5% billing fee (in those three regions); route the payment through your own checkout or an external web link and that 5% goes away. This is a real cut from the old 15%/30% rate card — but it is conditional, and the headline “10%” is not the number most studios will actually pay.

For years, the mobile duopoly ran a simple deal: 15% on your first million, 30% on everything after, take it or leave it. That deal is gone. What replaced it is more generous and far more complicated — a fee stack with a base rate, a separate billing fee, an install-age split, and an opt-in program gate. This piece is the operator’s spreadsheet: what the new rate card really is, who qualifies for the lower tiers, and whether your direct-to-consumer web shop still earns its keep now that Play itself is cheaper.

What actually changed on June 30, 2026

The change is the direct result of Google settling its worldwide disputes with Epic Games. In March 2026 Google announced it had “resolved our disputes worldwide with Epic Games”, and the new fee structure and billing rules are the concrete output of that settlement — the end of the litigation that started when Fortnite was pulled from the Play Store in 2020. Two things landed at once:

1. Billing choice. Developers can now offer an alternative payment system inside the app, or send users to their own website to complete a purchase, alongside Google Play billing — behind a choice screen you design to Google’s UX guidelines. This is the anti-steering wall coming down.
2. A re-priced, unbundled rate card. Google split the old single commission into a service fee (for access to the platform and distribution) and a separate billing fee (for payment processing) — and cut both.

The rollout is regional and staggered: EEA, UK and US on June 30, 2026, Australia on September 30, 2026, Japan and South Korea on December 31, 2026, and the rest of the world on September 30, 2027 (source). The launch date in each region also sets the line between a “new install” and an “existing install” — which, as you’ll see, is where a lot of the real money sits.

Alongside the fee change, Google opened a Registered App Stores program that streamlines the sideload flow for qualifying third-party stores. That is a separate, structural shift for the alt-store landscape — we track where that channel stands in the state of alternative app stores in 2026.

The actual rate card: 10% is the floor, not the rate

Here is the part the “10% fee” headlines skip. The 10% is real, but it only covers your first $1M in annual earnings. Above that threshold, what you pay depends on two things: whether the transaction comes from a new or existing install, and whether you’ve enrolled in one of Google’s incentive programs.

Tier	Standard fee	With Games Level Up
First $1M / year (all installs)	10%	10%
Above $1M — new installs	20%	15%
Above $1M — existing installs	25%	20%
Auto-renewing subscriptions	10%	10%

On top of any of those, if the transaction runs through Google Play billing, add a 5% billing fee (EEA/UK/US). Route it through alternative billing or an external web link and that 5% does not apply — you pay your own PSP costs instead (typically ~3-4% all-in).

Two things jump out for a games operator. First, subscriptions are now a flat 10% service fee — a genuinely strong number if your title is subscription-led. Second, the difference between the new-install and existing-install rate above $1M is 5 points, and enrolling in Games Level Up shifts every tier down another 5. For a live title with a large installed base, that existing-install rate is the one that governs most of your revenue, and 25% vs 20% is not a rounding error.

Games Level Up: the 15% is earned, not given

The lower 15%/20% tiers are gated behind the Google Play Games Level Up program, and it is an opt-in with homework. Google is explicit that these are incentive programs: you get the reduced rate in exchange for adopting Google’s game-services stack.

The milestones matter for planning. All games were auto-enrolled until the first program milestone in July 2026, which requires Play Games Services achievements and Play Games Sidekick integration (the in-game overlay Google is pushing to surface rewards, quests and AI-generated tips). A further milestone requires cloud save and seamless restore by November 2026 (source). Miss the milestones and you fall back to the standard 20%/25% rate above $1M.

So the honest framing for a studio is: the 15% tier is available, but it costs engineering time and a deeper dependency on Google’s platform features. That’s a legitimate trade for a high-revenue title. For a smaller game that never crosses $1M in a region, it’s mostly irrelevant — you’re paying 10% either way.

The take-home math: is a D2C web shop still worth it at these rates?

This is the decision that actually changed on June 30. Under the old 30% regime, a direct-to-consumer web shop was close to a no-brainer for high-LTV titles: you were dodging a 30% tax. Now that Play itself can be as low as 10-20%, the web shop has to re-earn its place. Modelling that trade-off across Play, a D2C shop and alt-store reach is the core of our distribution practice; here’s the shape of the math.

Take a studio above the $1M threshold, on the standard tier (not yet Level Up), selling a $100 in-app currency pack to an existing-install player in the US.

Route A — Google Play billing (existing install, standard tier):

• Service fee 25% → $25.00
• Billing fee 5% → $5.00
• You keep $70.00

Route B — alternative billing behind Play’s choice screen (existing install, standard tier):

• Service fee 25% → $25.00 (the service fee still applies)
• No Play billing fee; your own PSP ~3.5% → $3.50
• You keep $71.50

Route C — direct-to-consumer web shop (payment happens off-platform):

• No Play service fee, no Play billing fee
• Your PSP ~3.5% → $3.50; web-shop platform/ops, say ~5% → $5.00
• You keep $91.50

The gap is stark: $91.50 on your own web shop versus $70.00 through Play billing — roughly 31% more take-home per dollar at the existing-install standard rate. Even against the best-case Play path (Level Up new install: 15% service + 5% billing = you keep $80), the web shop is ahead by ~$11.50 per $100.

But — and this is the operator’s caveat — that spread only shows up on revenue you can actually move off-platform. A web shop converts a fraction of your players; the ones who bounce at “leave the app to pay” still transact through Play at the full stack. The right way to model it is blended: take-home = (web-shop share × $91.50) + (in-app share × $70.00). At a realistic 20% web-shop capture, your blended take-home is ~$74.30 per $100 — better than pure Play, but a long way from the $91.50 ceiling. The June 2026 changes didn’t kill the D2C case; they narrowed it and made the conversion rate of your web shop the single variable that decides whether it pays. We break down how to run that channel as a first-class product, not a bolt-on, in the multi-channel distribution framework.

What should a studio do next?

The reflex to “just take the 10%” is a trap if you’re a live title above $1M — that’s not your rate. Work the decision in this order:

1. Find your true blended rate. Split your revenue by new vs existing installs and by region (only EEA/UK/US are live today). Most live studios will discover their weighted average sits closer to 22-25% than 10%.
2. Price the Level Up trade. If you clear $1M in a live region, the engineering cost of achievements, Sidekick and cloud save probably pays for itself via the 5-point cut. Cost it out against a quarter of revenue.
3. Re-run the web-shop math with your real conversion. D2C still wins per-transaction, but only on captured revenue. If your web shop converts under ~10% of would-be buyers, the operational overhead may not clear the hurdle yet.
4. Don’t treat Play as the whole board. Cheaper Play fees don’t remove the discovery and UA-cost problems that pushed studios toward diversification in the first place — see the case for distribution beyond paid UA. The strongest position is a portfolio: Play at its lower rate, a D2C shop for whales, and alt-store or OEM reach where the economics beat Play outright, as they still often do (see the Core Technology Fee math on iOS and Epic Games Store mobile self-publishing at 0%/12%).

FAQ

Does Google Play really charge only 10% now?

Only on your first $1M of annual earnings per year, and only where the program is live (EEA, UK, US as of June 30, 2026). Above $1M, the service fee is 20% on new-install transactions and 25% on existing installs under the standard tier, or 15%/20% if you’re enrolled in the Games Level Up program. Auto-renewing subscriptions are a flat 10%. If you use Google Play’s own billing, add a separate 5% billing fee in those three regions.

What is the Google Play Billing Choice Program?

It’s the program, live since June 30, 2026, that lets developers offer an alternative billing system inside their app or direct users to their own website to complete a purchase, alongside Google Play billing, behind a choice screen. It also introduced the re-priced, unbundled rate card that splits the old commission into a service fee and a separate 5% billing fee. It went live first in the EEA, UK and US, expanding to Australia, Japan, South Korea and the rest of the world through September 2027.

How do I qualify for the 15% Google Play fee?

The 15% tier (on new-install transactions above $1M) requires enrolling in the Google Play Games Level Up program and meeting its milestones — Play Games Services achievements and Sidekick integration by the July 2026 milestone, and cloud save with seamless restore by November 2026. Games that don’t meet the milestones fall back to the standard 20% new-install / 25% existing-install rates above $1M.

Is a direct-to-consumer web shop still worth it after the fee cut?

Per transaction, yes: paying off-platform can leave you with roughly $91.50 of a $100 purchase versus about $70 through Play billing at the existing-install standard rate. But a web shop only captures a fraction of buyers, so the real question is your blended take-home. At a 20% web-shop capture rate, blended take-home is around $74 per $100 — better than pure Play, but well short of the ceiling. The web shop’s own conversion rate is now the variable that decides whether it pays.

Why did Google change its fees in 2026?

The new fee structure and billing-choice rules are the direct result of Google settling its worldwide disputes with Epic Games, announced in March 2026, ending litigation that began when Fortnite was removed from the Play Store in 2020. The settlement also produced a Registered App Stores program that streamlines sideloading for qualifying third-party stores.

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Working out your true blended Play rate, whether Level Up pays for your title, and how much of your revenue a web shop can realistically capture is exactly the modelling our distribution practice and Founding Developer Program do with studios. The fee card is public; whether the new math works for your catalogue is a question you can answer with a spreadsheet — talk to us before you re-plumb your billing.