This week's developments all sit on the same fault line: external and web-based payment channels are becoming legally available, but the platform fees attached to them remain unsettled on both sides of the Atlantic. In the US the link-out injunction is in force while the commission rate is still undecided, in the EU 18 developer groups are contesting Apple's revised terms, and the Supreme Court has agreed to hear Apple only on a narrow procedural point. Here is where each stands.

Apple's US link-out injunction is live, with the external-purchase commission rate still unset

The court order requiring Apple to let US App Store developers link customers out to complete a purchase on the web has been in force since the Supreme Court declined to pause it in August 2026, and remains in effect while Apple's separate appeal proceeds. It traces to the Ninth Circuit's ruling in Epic Games v. Apple, which affirmed "message screens" informing users about outside purchase options and "dynamic links" to an external checkout, and held Apple's total ban on commissions and link restrictions overbroad. The ruling did not settle whether Apple may charge a commission on external purchases or at what rate; no percentage appears in Apple's published materials or the reviewed court record, and the district court is to set the rate on remand. Mac Observer reported that a filing dated August 13, 2026 proposes a tiered commission — a standard 15%, with reduced tiers reported at 10% and lower for specific Apple programs — though it stated it could not open the underlying docket to confirm the wording.

Why it matters: Link-outs are legally available in the US today, but the economics are still unfixed: if the court blesses a rate near 15%, an external purchase still carries an Apple fee, so the real saving is the delta versus in-app commissions minus the cost of running web billing, tax and refunds. The rate is court-set rather than negotiable per developer, so the practical move is to build the link-out flow and model outcomes across the plausible range rather than wait for one confirmed number.

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18 developer groups tell Brussels Apple's October 1 EU terms still breach the DMA

An open letter co-signed by the Coalition for App Fairness, the European Games Developer Federation and others — 18 organisations in total — argues that Apple's revised EU App Store terms, announced on August 18 and due to take effect, still fail to comply with the Digital Markets Act. Its central complaint is Apple's 15% fee for steering users to payment options outside the App Store; the signatories note that DMA Article 5(4) requires steering to be free of charge, the same point on which the European Commission fined Apple €500m ($570m) in April 2025. The letter also objects to Apple's new 5% Core Technology Commission on transactions in apps distributed outside the App Store, noting that Windows and Linux charge no equivalent self-distribution fee. The Coalition for App Fairness — whose members include Epic Games, Match Group and Spotify — says the Commission has signalled informal acceptance of Apple's terms, and asks the EC to clarify its position and issue a formal, reasoned conclusion. The European Games Developer Federation represents 27 national trade bodies and 2,500 European developers.

Why it matters: For EU publishers this is a compliance-terms story: the fees on steering and on out-of-App-Store distribution determine whether an external channel beats in-app billing after Apple's cut, and whether steering can carry any fee at all under the DMA is still open. The addressable read is to treat the current 15% steering fee and 5% Core Technology Commission as live inputs to plan against now, while tracking whether the Commission's formal position lowers or removes them.

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The takeaway

The direction of travel in both the US and the EU is the same: external and web-based payment channels are opening, but each still carries a platform fee and a compliance, tax and fraud burden a publisher has to absorb somewhere. With the US commission rate awaiting the district court and the EU's formal DMA position still unresolved, the useful posture is to build the DTC channel now and model against a range rather than wait for the litigation to end. That operational layer — tax, refunds and fraud exposure across jurisdictions — is where a Merchant of Record like tokenz carries the load, letting publishers adjust as the numbers land instead of pausing.