The Ledger #22: EU Terms and Web Shop Holiday Readiness

Four items from the last fortnight, each with a line on what it changes for a buyer working a live account into the holiday.

This fortnight's platform roundup on EU terms and web shop holiday readiness

• Apple has confirmed its revised EU App Store terms take effect from 1 January 2026, replacing the per-install Core Technology Fee with a 5 percent Core Technology Commission for developers who move to the new terms, alongside tiered store services fees. What it means for buyers: model both fee structures against your actual EU revenue mix now, not in December, since the right choice depends heavily on install volume versus in-app revenue and that calculation takes longer than the holiday allows.
• Liftoff is reported to be preparing a confidential filing for an initial public offering in 2026, following a year in which MMPs have generally leaned into gaming benchmark reporting as a way to stay close to buyer budgets. What it means for buyers: a pre-IPO MMP typically becomes more conservative about product roadmap risk and more communicative about retention metrics in its reporting, which is worth watching if Liftoff is one of your measurement vendors.
• Web shop ramp continues into the holiday, with more publishers pointing US iOS traffic toward external purchase links ahead of peak spend, a trend this desk covered in A Web Shop Holiday Readiness Checklist Before Peak. What it means for buyers: if your studio has not yet load-tested its own web shop against holiday-scale traffic, this fortnight is close to the last comfortable window to do it properly.
• MMPs are publishing their usual Black Friday and Cyber Monday spend and install forecasts, pointing to the familiar pattern of CPM concentration through the last week of November. What it means for buyers: treat the forecasts as directional rather than exact, and have your own ceiling and reallocation rules agreed before the spike arrives, as this desk set out in Black Friday Mobile Game CPMs: What to Budget For Now.

Four stories, one pressure. Three of them point at the same clock: less than six weeks remain before the EU terms change and holiday peak spend both land. Neither is a decision that improves when you make it quickly.

Related archive reading

These articles provide related context and remain subject to their stated review status.

• A Web Shop Holiday Readiness Checklist Before Peak
• The Ledger #7: Gamescom week preview