To promote competition and reduce gatekeeper power in the app economy, increase choice, improve quality, and reduce costs for consumers.
Analysis under review: This bill has generated analysis that may be too generic or incomplete. Clause-level evidence remains available below.
Summary
What This Bill Does
The Open App Markets Act targets large app store operators (primarily Apple and Google) that control both an app store with over 50 million US users and the underlying operating system. It prohibits these "covered companies" from requiring developers to use their in-app payment systems, restricting developers from communicating pricing offers to users, or giving preferential treatment to their own apps.
Who Benefits and How
Third-party app developers benefit significantly by gaining the ability to use alternative payment systems (avoiding 15-30% commission fees), offer different prices on other platforms, and distribute apps through alternative app stores. Consumers benefit from potentially lower prices, more app choices, and the ability to install third-party app stores and set default apps.
Who Bears the Burden and How
Apple and Google (as covered companies) face substantial new compliance requirements: they must allow competing app stores, cannot mandate their payment systems, must provide equal API access to competitors, and face treble damages for violations. They lose significant revenue from mandatory commission structures and face FTC/DOJ/State AG enforcement.
Key Provisions
- Prohibits covered companies from requiring developers to use their in-app payment systems
- Requires operating systems to allow sideloading of third-party apps and app stores
- Bans self-preferencing in app store search rankings and algorithms
- Enables treble damages for injured developers plus state AG enforcement
Evidence Chain:
This summary is generated from the full bill text using AI analysis. Expand "Detailed Analysis" below for identified beneficiaries/burden bearers.
At a Glance
What This Bill Does
Regulates large app store operators (Apple, Google) to promote competition by prohibiting anti-competitive practices such as mandatory in-app payment systems, self-preferencing, and restrictions on third-party app distribution.
Key Policy Areas
Technology, Antitrust, Consumer Protection, Competition Policy
Primary Purpose
Regulates large app store operators (Apple, Google) to promote competition by prohibiting anti-competitive practices such as mandatory in-app payment systems, self-preferencing, and restrictions on third-party app distribution.
Policy Domains
Open App Markets Act
Identified Gains
Contextual inference, no direct clause citation- Third-party app developers
- Alternative app stores (e.g., Epic Games Store)
- Alternative payment processors
- Consumers
Contextual inference, no direct clause citation
Identified Costs
Contextual inference, no direct clause citation- Apple (iOS App Store)
- Google (Google Play Store)
- Other large app store operators meeting threshold
Contextual inference, no direct clause citation
Sponsors
Legislative Progress
IntroducedMrs. Blackburn (for herself, Mr. Blumenthal, Mr. Lee, Ms. Klobuchar, …
Stakeholder Effects
cui bono?How this legislation distributes effects. Mention counts reflect frequency, not effect magnitude.
Alphabet Inc. (Google Play Store and Android operating system), Alphabet Inc. (Google Play Store), Alternative app store operators
Apple Inc. and Alphabet Inc. (covered companies) faces effects in multiple directions
Positive-direction: Alternative app store operators, Intellectual property holders, Third-party app developers, Third-party app developers (e.g., Epic Games, Spotify)
Negative-direction: Alphabet Inc. (Google Play Store and Android operating system), Alphabet Inc. (Google Play Store), Apple Inc. (iOS App Store and iOS operating system), Apple Inc. (iOS App Store), Chinese technology companies (e.g., TikTok, Huawei)
DOJ Antitrust Division, Federal Trade Commission, Government Accountability Office
Alternative payment processors (e.g., Stripe, PayPal)
Bill Structure & Actor Mappings
Who is "The Secretary" in each section?
- "ftc"
- → Federal Trade Commission
- "state_ag"
- → State Attorneys General
- "attorney_general"
- → U.S. Attorney General
Key Definitions
Terms defined in this bill
A publicly available website, software application, or other electronic service that distributes apps from third-party developers to users
Any person that owns or controls an app store with over 50,000,000 US monthly users AND the operating system on which that app store operates
An application, service, or user interface to manage billing or process payments from users of an app
Nonpublic data derived from a developer or app, including user interactions, collected by a covered company in the course of operating an app store
We use a combination of our own taxonomy and classification in addition to large language models to assess meaning and potential beneficiaries. High confidence means strong textual evidence. Always verify with the original bill text.
Learn more about our methodology