Epic Games has added Spotify to its digital storefront, the Epic Games Store. The surprising move is another shot fired in the company’s long-standing feud with Apple, as Epic says it plans to bring more nongaming apps to its storefront.
Epic Games Store users can now download the Spotify app through the store for free, just as they can from Spotify’s website or other app stores. There doesn’t appear to be any added perk for downloading the music app through Spotify, such as a free month.
On its surface, the sudden strategic decision to add nongaming apps to Epic Games Store is a little puzzling. According to Polygon, there’s no transactional agreement between Epic and Spotify. Epic won’t receive any money from the storefront placement and reportedly isn’t taking a cut of Premium subscriptions either.
The move appears to be the next phase in the long-running rivalry between Epic and Apple. Earlier this year, the two companies clashed after Epic spoke out against Apple’s practice of taking a 30% cut of app purchases. By comparison, Epic only takes a 12% cut of games. The dispute ended with Apple removing Fortnite from the app store entirely.
By rolling out a plan to add services like Spotify to the Epic Games Store, Epic may be quietly building its own version of the App Store. The company says that its goal with new apps is to “create a more robust platform for developers,” which is in line with the pro-creator language that the company has touted throughout its feud with Apple. Epic CEO Tim Sweeney previously slammed Apple’s business practices, claiming that “Apple’s anticompetitive behavior threatens all developers on iOS.”
It’s unclear if Epic will build an entire App Store competitor, but Sweeney’s tweet about the announcement makes it clear that the service will continue to inch toward that route: “The Epic Games Store now stores more than games,” he said.
