Fortnite is back on iPhone, almost four years to the day after it was removed in a dispute between Apple and game maker Epic. As you can imagine, there’s a catch. It can only be downloaded in one place, the EU, and its return is due to the European Commission’s Digital Markets Act.
Fortnite is back on the iPhone.
As part of the DMA, Apple was required to allow the installation of app marketplaces alongside Apple’s own App Store, and on Friday, August 16, the most eagerly awaited of these marketplaces, the Epic Games Store, was released.
Once you download the store, which is only available to iPhone users in the EU who have iOS 17.6 installed, you’ll have access to a small number of games, including Fall Guys and – the big one – Fortnite. Epic says the number of games will grow.
The story of the dispute between Apple and Epic is that Apple accused Epic of wanting to avoid commissions on in-app purchases and removed the game from the App Store. Fortnite is free to download and use, but has its own in-game currency that users can purchase. For exactly four years, in August 2020, the game has been unplayable on the iPhone or iPad.
While it remains available on Android devices, Android users around the world can now also download it from the Epic Games Store, as well as another digital storefront called AltStore Pal.
For iPhone, the Epic Games Store is the fifth alternative marketplace now available in the EU. The other three are Setapp Mobile, Aptoide (which has not yet fully launched) and Mobivention, which has a B2B focus.
The Epic Games Store is by far the largest of these. Installation is easy, if a bit cumbersome. Once you’ve decided to download, you’ll need to immediately go to the Settings app and confirm that you’re OK with installing games from the Epic Games Store. Then go back to the Epic website and select “Download.”
Once you’ve done that, playing Fortnite is easy and runs as smoothly and well as ever.
Will this lead to more countries adopting the same rules as the EU? The US, UK and Australia are likely to be watching closely to see whether they should follow suit.
Currently, users in the EU can visit Epic’s website on their iPhones and download the storefront.
While Apple explicitly did not want to allow sideloading of games and seriously states that the safety of the user experience is at the heart of its objections, the company also does not want to lose the revenue it receives from developers – which was the catalyst for the dispute with Epic. Personally, I suspect that most users are happy with the convenience and reliability of having just one marketplace, the Apple App Store, on their iPhones. But this could be a turning point for iPhone users in the EU.
