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We haven\u2019t heard the last of Epic\u2019s crusade<\/a> against Apple over the iPhone maker\u2019s App Store fees.<\/p>\n Epic Games filed a cert petition with the Supreme Court on Wednesday, setting things in motion for the highest court in the land to reexamine if Apple\u2019s software business violates federal antitrust laws.<\/p>\n We\u2019ll know in the coming months if the Supreme Court will select the case, which would reopen a protracted legal battle between the two companies that\u2019s wended its way through the courts for going on five years now. Apple will likely file a petition soon too, taking issue with a previous ruling that was partially sympathetic to Epic\u2019s complaints.<\/p>\n Epic Games, which makes Fortnite and runs its own software marketplace, the Epic Games Store, initially sued Apple<\/a> back in 2020. That lawsuit came after Apple booted Fortnite from iOS<\/a> \u2014 a controversy that Epic itself kicked off by purposefully breaking App Store rules by giving players a way to pay directly for Fortnite\u2019s in-game currency.<\/p>\n That workaround circumvented Apple\u2019s controversial fees, running afoul of the tech giant\u2019s guidelines in the process and kicking off Epic\u2019s vigorous campaign to rally developers against Apple\u2019s longstanding software practices.<\/p>\n Earlier this year, Apple largely won an appeals court fight with Epic stemming from the same complaints over the company\u2019s App Store policies. In an opinion issued in April<\/a>, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld most of a previous decision issued by a federal judge in U.S District Court for the Northern District of California. That ruling denied most of Epic\u2019s argument that Apple violates federal antitrust laws by boxing out alternative software markets on iOS.<\/p>\n While the courts mostly landed on Apple\u2019s side, the federal judge did rule that Apple violated California\u2019s Unfair Competition Law by restricting developers from telling consumers about alternative payment options \u2014 a sliver of a win for Epic. The appeals court affirmed that decision earlier this year.<\/p>\n With the ongoing legal fight now headed in the direction of the Supreme Court<\/a>, Epic requested that developers be allowed to point iPhone users toward payment options beyond Apple\u2019s walled garden. That request was rejected<\/a> by Justice Elena Kagan in August, meaning that Apple\u2019s existing rules will remain in place for now unless the Supreme Court decides not to weigh in after all.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n