The European Commission issued two non-compliance decisions against Google on 23 July 2026 under the Digital Markets Act. One covers self-preferencing of the company's own services on Google Search. The other covers restrictions on steering through Google Play. The Commission fined Google 460 million euros on the search finding and 430 million euros on the Play finding, 890 million euros in total.
Commission press release IP/26/1670 carries the finding. The Commission ordered Google to end the non-compliance, set a 60 day deadline, and named periodic penalty payments of up to 5 percent of total worldwide turnover.
The Conduct the Order Names
The Commission found that Google gives preferential treatment to its own services, including shopping, hotels, transport and sports results, over third-party services in Google Search. It found the company displays its own services more prominently, at the top of the results page or through enhanced visuals and filters.
The order requires Google to treat third-party services that feature on its search results in a fair and non-discriminatory manner by reference to its own services. That requirement covers ranking.
The order carries a second requirement on Google Play. Google must allow app developers to communicate, promote offers and conclude contracts with users outside the Play store, both technically and contractually.
What Google Has Reported on Hotel Traffic
Google has made more than 20 changes to Search in Europe in response to the legislation. For travel searches those changes introduced dedicated features that raise the prominence of comparison sites and removed or altered some of Google's own search functionality.
Google said in 2024 that hotels had reported declines of as much as 30 percent in free direct booking clicks after the initial changes. Google ran a European test that temporarily removed certain hotel search features. The company reported that hotels lost more than 10 percent of their traffic in that test while traffic to intermediary sites stayed largely flat. Google ended the test.
Both figures come from Google. No third party has reproduced either measurement in the public record.
The bylined commentary that carried the 30 percent figure through the trade press was written by Debbie Miller of Cayuga Hospitality Consultants. Hotel News Resource and Hotel Online published it on 17 September 2026. The account describes more prominent placement for vertical search services and comparison platforms in relevant European searches, and a more limited format for direct hotel listings.
What the Contract Still Carries
The order governs how Google ranks third-party services on its own search results. Commission rates, parity clauses and rate commitments sit in the contract a hotel signs with an intermediary.
A hotel's channel cost therefore turns on the terms it agrees and on the business each channel delivers. The order reaches the ranking surface above that negotiation.
What a Procurement Team Holds Now
Two numbers reached the public through Google: a 30 percent decline in free direct booking clicks and a 10 percent traffic loss in the stopped test. Both describe the period before the July 2026 decisions.
For a sales or procurement team the order sets a ranking obligation on one surface. Direct booking volume, channel cost and the terms a hotel concedes remain a negotiation against an intermediary's own scale.