Fortnite’s lengthy exile from the iPhone and iPad looks set to end soon, at least in the EU. Having declared back in January its intention to bring the popular game back to iOS in 2024, Epic Games today boasted that it will also return to iPadOS this year.
Back in 2020, Epic tested the limits of Apple’s App Store policies by adding a direct payment option to the game. Apple, predictably, responded by removing Fortnite from its platforms (Google did the same) and deleting the company’s developer account. While Epic’s account has since been reinstated, Fortnite remains unavailable in the App Store.
The companies have spent the last three and a half years litigating the dispute to determine whether it is lawful for app store owners to forbid direct payment options, among other issues. On a global scale that remains unresolved, but the Digital Markets Act (DMA) appears to decide the matter in Epic’s favor in the EU. Indeed it goes further and sets the stage for developers to sell iOS apps via their own stores, with more latitude and lower fees as of iOS 17.4. (Albeit perhaps not very much lower.)
The DMA affects tech companies in numerous ways and Apple itself has acknowledged that it “expects to make further business changes” as a result of the legislation. And a triumphant Epic tweeted in January that “Later this year Fortnite will return in Europe on iOS through the @EpicGames Store,” explicitly thanking the DMA for making this return possible. It’s not clear when Apple will comply with the ruling, but presumably in the fall with iOS 18 at the latest.
All of which brings us finally up to date, and to today’s tweet boasting that the European Commission has ruled that the iPad is subject to the same laws and that Fortnite (and Epic’s store) will appear on the iPad before the end of 2024. This is bad news for Apple, but it’s hard to disagree that it’s good news for iPad owners in the EU, assuming Apple doesn’t have some counterploy up its sleeve.