The Commission imposed the fine, totalling €1.494 billion, on the search giant in 2019 after finding that it had abused its dominant position in the online search advertising intermediation market.

The decision related to Google’s AdSense for Search (AFS) service, which allows third-party publishers to display Google ads on their own websites’ search result pages.

Publishers seeking to use AFS were asked to sign service agreements with clauses restricting or prohibiting the display of ads from services competing with AFS.

The Commission argued that these “anti-competitive contractual restrictions” were illegal under EU antitrust rules.

In today’s judgment, the General Court upheld the majority of the Commission’s findings but annulled the decision by which the Commission imposed the fine on Google.

It said the Commission had, inter alia, failed to take into consideration all the relevant circumstances in its assessment of the duration of the contract clauses that the Commission had deemed abusive.

In a statement, Google said: “We are pleased that the court has recognised errors in the original decision and annulled the fine. We will review the full decision closely.”