A week ago, Epic Games was celebrating its impending return to iOS. But now, it has announced that its Fortnite submission to the App Store has been rejected by Apple.

A U.S. Federal Judge had ruled that Apple should no longer charge a 27% commission fee on purchases that are made outside its platform, because it was anticompetitive. This ruling had been welcomed as a big breakthrough for developers who wanted to use third-party payment methods in their apps, to avoid Apple's high fees, and provide cheaper options for users who wanted to buy their in-app products, or subscribe to their services.

Apple removed Fortnite from the App Store in 2020, when Epic Games had included a payment option that bypassed Apple's payment rules. This lead to a lawsuit, in which both parties have had rulings in their favor. A judge found that Apple was within its legal rights to terminate Epic's app developer account, because it had willfully violated the guidelines. This essentially means that Apple is not obligated to allow Fortnite to return to the App Store, at least not under its U.S. based account.

Epic Games had revealed recently that it had submitted Fortnite to the iOS App Store, and that this version supported Apple’s In-App Purchase system, and also offered an external payment option. However, there is no official word to explain why Apple has rejected Fortnite's submission to the U.S. App Store. Oddly, Apple has also rejected the game's submission to the EU App Store. This is surprising because Fortnite was available for iPhone via Epic's own app marketplace, and also on AltStore PAL. Epic has said that it is trying to get its EU App Store account to bring Fortnite to the App Store.

This ongoing feud between Epic Games and Apple has been annoying for fans of Fortnite. Gamers have criticized Apple for its stubbornness to block Fortnite from being hosted via the App Store, terming its attitude as "childish behavior".

Source: 9to5Mac