How much does Google pay Apple to maintain its default search engine?

Although Google and Apple are competing in the smartphone market, iOS default search is also set to Google. This is through a success reward contract. Google is paying Apple a huge sum of $1 billion per year in 2014 and $3 billion per year in 2017, but the latest report in 2020 shows that the amount has increased further.

The report was compiled by UK government digital services, and while numbers and phrases were covered for confidential information, Google in 2019 indicated that the total amount paid for search traffic in the UK was £1.2 billion. Google has signed a success-reward type contract on the condition of setting the default search engine to Google for mobile phone operators, terminal manufacturers, and third-party browsers or operating systems. Apple is responsible for most of the payments.

Looking at the trend of payments, Apple is overwhelmingly more than Android and is increasing year by year. The UK government digital services, which compiled the report on this situation, pointed out that Google and Apple are working together to hinder competition in the search engine market, and regulated measures, such as requiring users to display a selection screen to select a default search engine. It is stated that it should be made possible by the authorities. Meanwhile, Microsoft is also signing similar contracts with Google to make Bing the default search engine with a number of companies. Related information can be found here .