EU orders Google to open Android AI and share search data

The European Commission adopted binding specification decisions on 16 July 2026 requiring Google to open key Android AI features to rival assistants and to share anonymised Google Search data with competing search engines and AI chatbots. These are enforceable orders under the Digital Markets Act, not fines. The rollout runs through 2027 and 2028: Alphabet must finalise its pricing offer for the search data by January 2027, the Android interoperability measures must ship in Android 18 by 1 August 2027, and voice activation for multiple assistants follows in Android 19 by 1 August 2028.

What happened

The decisions conclude two specification proceedings the Commission opened against Google’s parent Alphabet on 27 January 2026. The first, under Article 6(7), requires Google to give third-party developers free and effective interoperability with Android features currently reserved for its own AI services, such as Gemini. In practice, a user will be able to activate a rival AI assistant by voice even when it is not the default assistant, and that assistant will be able to act inside apps, for example to look up store information or complete a booking. The Commission specified that interoperability must not be conditioned on the AI provider holding the default role, and it describes Android, used by around 60% of European mobile users, as a key channel for AI services to reach users.

The second proceeding, under Article 6(11), requires Google to give rival search engines and AI chatbots with search functionality access to anonymised ranking, query, click and view data on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms. The Commission set out anonymisation safeguards: users grouped into bundles of at least 1,000, identifiers removed, rare or sensitive records suppressed, and access limited to vetted firms with a plan to improve search, under independent audit.

Google objected to the measures. Its president of global affairs, Kent Walker, argued they risk exposing Europeans’ private searches to unfamiliar companies and weakening privacy and security protections.

Google must give rival search engines access to anonymised ranking, query, click and view data on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms.

European Commission, Digital Markets Act specification decision

Why it matters

For years, being found locally meant ranking on Google. These decisions start to unbundle that. If rival assistants can be voice-activated on Android and take actions inside apps, and if competing engines and chatbots can learn from Google’s own search signals, the number of places a customer can discover a business goes up. The same underlying location facts start feeding many more answer engines, each free to present a business in its own way.

What this means for multi-location brands

For a national retailer, a dealer group, a pharmacy network or a fuel operator, the practical shift is that Google is no longer the only consumer of the data that decides whether each site shows up. Rival assistants taking in-app actions, and chatbots drawing on shared search data, will read whatever a brand publishes about its locations. That raises the cost of inconsistency: a wrong opening hour or address is now wrong in more places at once. Managing location data centrally through an API, rather than platform by platform, is what keeps a brand accurate everywhere the data now travels, and monitoring how AI answers actually describe each location, through Places AI, becomes part of visibility work rather than an extra. Brands that already treat AI search results as a channel are better placed for a market with several answer engines instead of one.

The bottom line

The DMA is turning Google’s search and Android advantages into shared infrastructure. Non-compliance can draw fines of up to 10% of global annual turnover, so the obligations are likely to hold. The brands that come out ahead will be the ones whose location data is accurate and centrally governed, because it will be readable wherever Europe’s opening market carries it.