Justice Department to Appeal Ruling in Google Search Antitrust Case

The Justice Department and 35 states will appeal a September 2025 court ruling that allowed Google parent company Alphabet to keep its Chrome browser after losing an antitrust case.

The plaintiffs said Tuesday (Feb. 3) in court papers that they will appeal the ruling, Reuters reported Tuesday.

A federal court judge ruled in 2024 that Google has a monopoly in the online search business, but later rejected the toughest potential remedies, according to the report.

Bloomberg also reported on the appeal notices filed Tuesday, saying that the September ruling imposed “modest limits” on Google’s contracts related to its search engine and artificial intelligence apps, and rejected arguments that the company should be forced to sell its Chrome browser.

The Justice Department and states had asked for tougher measures, and the judge’s ruling in September was seen as a loss for the plaintiffs, according to the report.

A U.S. Court of Appeals will likely hear the cases later this year, and that court generally issues a decision about a year after an appeal notice is filed, per the report.

PYMNTS reported in October 2024 that the Justice Department asked the judge to compel Google to break up its core businesses to prevent anti-competitive practices.

The Justice Department said in a court filing that its opinion was that Google sustained monopolistic control over search and advertising markets through illegal practices and that for at least the previous 10 years, “Google’s anticompetitive conduct resulted in interlocking and pernicious harms that present unprecedented complexities in a highly evolving set of markets.”

The filing listed options to stop Google from gaining a competitive advantage by using its app store, Android operating system and Chrome browser to boost its search business.

Google said at the time in a statement shared with PYMNTS: “The DOJ’s radical and sweeping proposals risk hurting consumers, businesses and developers.” The company added that “the DOJ’s outline also comes at a time when competition in how people find information is blooming, with all sorts of new entrants emerging and new technologies like [artificial intelligence] transforming the industry.”

Following the September ruling on remedies, PYMNTS reported that the penalty imposed on the company by the judge was far more modest than the Justice Department had sought and competitors had hoped for. It merely barred Google from paying for exclusivity on devices and required it to share only a limited amount of search data.