The 30% Era Is Over. Google Play's Games GM Explains What Comes Next.
Here’s why this is important…
For fifteen years, the 30% platform fee was the closest thing mobile gaming had to a law of physics. Last week it cracked. Google Play is decoupling its service fee from its billing fee, opening alternative billing and external purchase links in the US, UK, and EEA, and cutting the standard rate to 20% for new installs. Run your own payments and the billing fee disappears entirely.
Google didn't wake up generous. Epic sued, regulators pushed, and a settlement forced the change. But for game and app developers, motive matters less than math. The new structure reshapes web shop economics, subscription margins, and the entire UA calculus for anyone spending against LTV on Android.
The fine print cuts both ways. Players who installed before the rollout are billed at 25%, five points above new installs, which means your most loyal cohorts are your most expensive ones.
While rate cuts might have stolen the headlines, it’s the Level Up program from Google Play that is built to offer Play Store users engagement boosting experiences in form of a personalized hub, a sidekick overlay, quests, leagues and much more. All with extremely simple integration and further rate cuts (case study: How Sybsway Surfers boosts engagement by 45% with Level Up)
The Level Up rate card doesn't open until September 30 and comes with compliance strings attached, including a Sidekick overlay developers can't fully control. So we sent our hardest questions to the man responsible for all of it.
Meet Aurash
Aurash Mahbod is the GM of Games on Google Play, which makes him the executive accountable for every number in this announcement. He agreed to a written deep dive with us and, to his credit, didn't duck a single question or follow-up; Jen and Mishka from Deconstructor of Fun launched his way.
Not on why loyal players cost developers more, not on Sidekick, not on whether leaving Play billing shadow-bans your ranking. Where he disagreed with our framing, he said so and argued his case. That's rarer than it should be at his level.
Aurash’s answers are published in full, edited only for formatting.
Deconstructor of Fun: You're charging developers more for their loyal players than for brand-new ones. Why? What's the thinking there?
Aurash: We look at this through the lens of supporting developer growth and user acquisition.
By universally reducing the standard service fee on one-time purchases to 20% for new installs (and separating the billing fee), we are meaningfully lowering the barrier to acquiring new players and helping studios scale their audiences faster.
For existing installs, the 25% base fee reflects the platform’s historical and ongoing investment in acquiring, supporting, and maintaining that established user base. It’s also important to note that this structure is decoupled from the billing fee, so developers have the flexibility to use alternative billing for loyal players if they feel their own systems better serve that relationship, thereby removing the separate Google Play billing fee entirely.
Deconstructor of Fun Follow Up:While we sympathize with the predicament, this answer needs more specificity on the reasons, especially since it feels unfair to the valuable player cohorts and adds ongoing complexity in revenue and KPI tracking for New and Existing Players.
How will the Play Console handle showcasing the different cohorts? Additionally, how do you define and audit a "new install" so it cannot be gamed through reinstalls or prompted updates?
Aurash: We charge existing users at closer to the original rate because those users were acquired when the service fee for Play was higher. This reflects the historical and ongoing investment we made in the joint success of those titles. We are trying to minimize any confusion for developers that may arise in the short term from these important changes to our platform, and we are working hard to provide sufficient transparency through our various communication channels to help those participating in Level Up maximize their opportunity.
Regarding how we define and audit installs, our systems are built to prevent gaming the framework design. Two things to note: (1) when we announce a new program, it is expressly forward-looking; and (2) an install is calculated as of the time the unique user downloads the game for the first time against their account.
So, in this instance, once the new rate card is rolled out in a specific region, unique users in that region that install a game for the first time will be classified as a “new install” for purposes of that game. If a user has previously owned the app on their account, a reinstall or an update to an app they installed years ago is considered an "existing install" and maintains the historical fee structure associated with that user’s lifecycle.
Deconstructor of Fun: You're requiring developers to add an AI helper that gives players tips and walkthroughs. A player who needs Gemini to explain how to beat a level is usually a sign that the game has a design problem. If the player benefit were real, why would it need to be mandatory?
Aurash: Let me correct the record directly here, because there has been some confusion on this point: Gemini Live is not a mandatory requirement for the Games Level Up program. It’s an optional feature in Early Access with a few partners.
Sidekick provides players with instant access to Google Play rewards, community, and leaderboard layers without the need to leave the game. Gemini Live AI player assistant is an optional feature currently being tested by select developers.
What Level Up does require is enabling Play Games Services and Sidekick. Sidekick is not an AI coach. It is a seamless, in-game overlay that allows players to track their achievements, check game stats, play leagues, and claim rewards without ever having to leave the game. Think of it as a dashboard or other menu system that other game platforms (like consoles or PC storefronts) have historically made available to gamers. The goal of Sidekick is to keep players immersed in the experience developers have built by giving them access to things that they would have previously left the game for. You are entirely in control of how your game is played.
Two examples to illustrate this:
If a player joins a league for a game in the Play Store, Sidekick enables them to see their position in that league, as well as what rank their friends are, without having to close out of or minimize the game.
2. If a player sees a new user acquisition quest in the store (e.g., “play this game and get to level 10 to unlock a reward”), and installs and joins the game, we want to ensure that the player can directly see their progress towards that reward in the game, and even claim the reward without leaving the game. In addition to providing gamers the functionality to see visual evidence of their progression through their games whenever the user chooses to open Sidekick, the surface also provides the gamer contextually relevant game information and platform functionality (e.g., take a screenshot, stream to YouTube, etc.), again, without having to leave the game.
Deconstructor of Fun Follow Up:Can a developer turn off specific Sidekick functions, and can Sidekick surface other studios' games or quests to a player while they are inside my game? Can studios control the content in Sidekick? What player and gameplay data does Sidekick collect or expose, and who controls it?
Aurash: Developers can't control which functions show up in Sidekick (“turn them on/off”), but they are able to provide content that shows directly in Sidekick like their official videos, events and offers, and any Play Point offers they have configured. Developers can also configure the default location of the Sidekick “pull” to appropriately place the pull for each game. (Note: users can reposition the “pull” to their liking on a game-by-game basis on their personal devices).
Sidekick surfaces engagement mechanics to gamers, like: achievements, quests, and leagues that developers manage. Sidekick doesn't surface other studios’ games or quests to the player, as that would defeat the purpose of Sidekick (surfacing game-relevant content to the user to maximize their enjoyment and engagement with their game). We capture engagement with Sidekick for product improvement and health monitoring.
The whole level up program is intended to ensure players have a great Android / Play gaming experience. We think Sidekick is an important part of this, and we're excited for you all to see the drumbeat of features we have in store!
Deconstructor of Fun: The new "discount" programs lower fees only if developers meet your conditions... What does a studio actually have to do to get in? Is this a reward for quality or a lever for developers to integrate Google's AI into their game experiences?
Aurash: As I mentioned, this has nothing to do with integrating Google's AI. Full stop. The Games Level Up program is explicitly a reward for technical quality and cross-device excellence.
To unlock the Level Up rate card, a title must meet specific, objective benchmarks across three main pillars:
Stable, premium gameplay: Maintaining 60 FPS on reference devices, keeping ANRs (crashes) to an absolute minimum, and utilizing modern APIs like Vulkan. As a reminder, Vulkan is the default graphics driver for Android (as of last year), so including Vulkan integration as a program guideline is about rewarding titles’ timely adoption of the platform’s best practices.
Cross-screen reach: Optimizing for large screens, foldables, and supporting Google Play Games on PC with precision mouse/keyboard inputs. Think of this as rewarding games that invest in meeting players where they are, across all of the screens they use.
Consistent mechanics: Offering robust achievements, engaging game stats, and implementing cloud saves. And to be clear on that last point, developers are free to use Google's cloud save solution or any third-party cloud save provider of their choice [(this is consistent, by the way, with how we address identity systems – developers are free to use any identity system they want (or none at all))].
We know achieving this level of cross-form-factor excellence takes real engineering resources. The Level Up program rate card benefit is there to recognize the specific titles that pursue that investment.
Deconstructor of Fun Follow Up:As part of Level Up, the cross-screen reach requirement requiring mobile games to be compatible with mouse and keyboard might be technically challenging. More importantly, not in a player's best interests for their gameplay experience. Is there a process for determining if a game can be exempt from these specific requirements?
Aurash: We’ve seen significant interest from gamers in playing their favorite games across the form factors they own – inclusive of tablets (with detachable keyboards), as well as TV/AR 2D projection/mobile with a controller. Supporting these modes of input means unlocking a high-quality experience for these players when playing their favorite games across surfaces.
Improved input support directly addresses the needs of players who use these form factors. As mentioned, we seek to put the gamer at the center of everything we do. We've designed the Level Up guidelines to facilitate what we believe are best practices for titles that desire to provide superlative experiences for gamers.
To directly answer your exemption question: Yes, developers can seek an exemption from certain specific Level Up guidelines (including input). Information about those exemptions is available at: https://developer.android.com/games/guidelines
Deconstructor of Fun Follow Up: The new fees start June 30, but the Level Up rate card does not open until September 30. Are there any retroactive discounts to the program start, or is it only from Sept 30 on, assuming full requirement compliance?
Aurash: We are immediately reducing our service fee down to 20% for new installs and separating the billing fee in the US, EEA, and UK, with future markets coming soon. That is true for all games on our platform regardless of whether they adopt the Level Up guidelines – essentially with no actions required by developers. Again, that is effective immediately.
The billing and Level UP rollout started in late June and will continue till the end of September. It is divided into billing first and then the users will be getting Level Up access.
The Level Up program rate card does not apply retroactively, and rolls out on Sept 30th to the US, UK, EEA, and AU. It expands to JP/KR on Dec 31st, and the rest of the world on Sept 30th, 2027.
Deconstructor of Fun Follow Up: If a title slips below the bar after qualifying, does it lose the rate card immediately, and is there an appeal?
The point of the Level Up program is for the participating titles to provide superlative gaming experiences to gamers. Gamers get maximum value if the title fully adopts the program’s features and functionality. Given the significant financial investment we are making in encouraging developers to invest in these requirements, they do need to maintain compliance to maintain access to the program benefits. However, as we do with other programs on Play, developers would be given a reasonable warning period to come into compliance and opportunities to appeal if appropriate.
Deconstructor of Fun Follow Up: What are the key technical requirements for Level up? Play Games Servicesv2 SKD? Anything else developers should be aware of and prepare for?
Aurash: A comprehensive set of technical requirements can be found in the Level Up guidelines. A high-level overview of the program can be found here. For completeness, if you have additional questions about the new standard rate card that is live in the US, UK, and EEA today, that information can be found here.
Deconstructor of Fun: If a developer moves payments off Google Play, does it hurt them anywhere else? Does that cost it anything in how its app gets ranked, featured, or supported by Google's ad and marketing tools? A clear yes or no on the record would matter more to developers than any fee number in this announcement.
Aurash: No, it does not. The choice of billing system does not impact a game’s organic store ranking, discoverability, or eligibility for featuring on Google Play.
Google Play will be offering alternative billing and the ability to direct users to the developers’ own websites.
We are decoupling our platform service fee from our billing fee specifically to give developers this choice. Store ranking and organic visibility will continue to be driven by what matters most to players - things like game quality, relevance, stability, and user engagement metrics.
Deconstructor of Fun: Apple is being forced to open up its payments, too. A few years from now, what's left that makes a developer choose Google Play's billing instead of just collecting payments themselves?
Aurash: We know that we have to earn a developer's business based on the value our commerce engine provides, and we are highly confident in that value.
Operating a global digital storefront is incredibly complex. Google Play's billing system safely and efficiently handles the intricacies of global tax compliance, local regulations, fraud protection, and subscription management across 195+ markets. We support over 300 local payment methods right out of the box. For a 5% billing fee, developers get a frictionless, highly optimized checkout experience that consistently drives superior conversion rates because it utilizes a payment profile the user already trusts. And if a studio believes they can build, scale, and maintain a global commerce infrastructure that converts better and costs less than 5%, we want them to have the flexibility to do so.
Deconstructor of Fun: You're rolling this out in the EU, the UK, and the US first. Those are the regions with the most antitrust pressure. How much of this is what regulators are forcing?
Aurash: These changes represent a fundamental shift in our business model globally, not just a regional adjustment. All developers around the world can take advantage of these changes for their users in jurisdictions where the shift has been rolled out. However, deploying a change of this technical and operational magnitude – decoupling global billing systems, rolling out new APIs for alternative payments, and ensuring compliance with vastly different local regulations in over 190 countries – requires a staggered timeline.
We are launching the initial phase on June 30 for users in the US, UK, and EEA to ensure the infrastructure is rock solid. Following this, we have a clear, previously announced roadmap to roll this updated model out to the rest of the world over the next year. Our goal is expanded flexibility and opportunity for the entire Android ecosystem, globally.
Deconstructor of Fun: The bottom line
Strip away the program branding and three things are true. The floor is lower: 20% for new installs plus an optional 5% billing fee beats the old 30% in every scenario, and web shops just got materially better on Android. The complexity is higher: finance teams now track fees by cohort, region, and rollout date, and the new-versus-existing install split will haunt KPI dashboards for years. And the leverage has moved: Google is no longer defending 30% with policy. It's defending 5% with product. That's a healthier fight for everyone.
The answer that matters most is the one Aurash gave on the record: moving payments off Play does not affect ranking, featuring, or discoverability. Hold Google to that sentence. The rest is spreadsheet work. Run the numbers on your own cohort mix, because for the first time in fifteen years, the math is actually yours to do.
