Xbox players with Android devices will soon be able to buy and play games directly from the official Xbox app.
Xbox president Sarah Bond posted a message on X which referred to this week’s US court ruling that Google has to open its Android marketplace to competitors.
Bond stated that the ruling would enable Xbox players to buy and play games from its Android app.
“The court’s ruling to open up Google´s mobile store in the US will allow more choice and flexibility,” Bond wrote.
“Our mission is to allow more players to play on more devices so we are thrilled to share that starting in November, players will be able to play and purchase Xbox games directly from the Xbox App on Android.”
It’s not immediately clear which games will be available via the Xbox app, or whether the feature will extend beyond the US to players in other regions.
This week’s ruling is the most significant development yet in Epic Games’ long-running antitrust lawsuit against Google, which said on Monday that’s it’s planning to appeal the verdict.
According to the ruling, from November 1 for a three-year period in the US, Google will:
- not be allowed to pay developers to launch apps first or exclusively through the Play Store
- be barred from offering manufacturers or carriers incentives to pre-install Google Play (or to not pre-install rival stores) on new devices
- not be able to force app makers to use Google Play Billing
- not be allowed to require a developer to set a price based on whether Google Play is used
- not be able to restrict developers from pointing users to external payment options outside of the Play Store
Xbox has been talking for some time about launching a mobile app store, with head of gaming Phil Spencer stating last year that Microsoft was already preparing for the date at which this could be legally possible.
In December, Spencer also told Bloomberg about a potential Xbox mobile marketplace: “I don’t think this is multiple years away, I think this is sooner than that.”
