The Digital Markets Act promised fairer search. It’s failing.

TL;DR: Digital Markets Act and fairer search in Europe

The Digital Markets Act has not made search meaningfully fairer for founders or small businesses; it has mostly added friction while Google keeps control of demand. For you, that means more risk if your leads depend on search, local discovery, travel queries, or comparison pages.

• The article argues that EU DMA rules changed Google’s search page design, not Google’s market power. Users face more clicks, slower search journeys, and often return to Google anyway, which matches concerns raised in this piece on fairer search failing.

• Data cited from 2024, 2026 points to worse commercial search flows: longer search times, more query reformulation, weaker hotel and travel conversion, and little lasting gain for rival services. That means small companies can lose traffic and bookings without getting a real competitive upside.

• The biggest lesson for you is practical: do not rely on one search surface. Build branded demand, email lists, repeat-use product hooks, referrals, partnerships, and direct channels before the next search or AI interface shift hits.

The piece also notes that the EU is now pushing Google on search data access, a move covered in the first DMA review, but the author’s advice is clear: do not wait for regulators to fix your distribution risk, start mapping your search dependence now.

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A brutal startup truth from 2026 is this: founders do not die from lack of ideas. They die from gatekeepers that can reroute demand overnight. If your company depends on search traffic, local discovery, travel queries, product listings, or comparison shopping, then the Digital Markets Act, or DMA, matters to your survival as much as funding and pricing do. The promise was simple. Europe would make search fairer. Two years into enforcement, the evidence says something far less comforting. Search got messier, slower, and no more open in any durable way.

I say this as a European founder who has spent years building companies in regulated, technical markets. I have worked across deeptech, startup tooling, edtech, AI, and IP-heavy products. I have learned the hard way that rules written with the right intention can still fail in the interface where real people make choices. That is exactly what seems to be happening here. The DMA targeted Google’s self-preferencing in search. It did not break Google’s power. It mostly changed the shape of the page.

Here is the real question for entrepreneurs, freelancers, and business owners: if regulation changes the page but not the market, who pays the price? In many cases, it is the small company that loses clicks, the hotel that loses direct bookings, the startup that loses discoverability, and the user who gives up and goes back to Google anyway.

What is going wrong with fairer search under the Digital Markets Act?

The DMA, formally Regulation (EU) 2022/1925, was built to curb the power of digital gatekeepers. In search, the target was clear. Google could no longer unfairly favor its own services such as Google Shopping, Google Flights, Google Hotels, and Google Maps over rivals. On paper, that sounds hard to oppose. Google had a long record of abuse, including the shopping case that led to a multibillion euro penalty. Europe was right to see the problem.

Yet a law can diagnose the disease and still prescribe the wrong treatment. Search is not a static list of ten blue links anymore. It is a product made of maps, reviews, prices, snippets, commerce modules, booking layers, AI summaries, and local intent signals. The DMA tried to correct unfair ranking behavior inside that product. It did not remove the gatekeeper’s control over distribution, defaults, data, and interface design. So we got a familiar pattern. Google changed the packaging, while keeping the gravitational pull.

That mismatch sits at the heart of the problem. Entrepreneurs needed contestability, meaning a real chance to compete. Users needed clear, useful search journeys. Europe delivered procedural fights over page design while the market kept moving toward AI answers and deeper Google ecosystems. Even the European Commission’s 2026 DMA review report presents progress across obligations, yet search remains one of the hardest areas to fix because the technical and commercial levers sit inside one dominant system.

Why should founders and business owners care right now?

Because this is not an abstract Brussels policy debate. It is a distribution crisis. Search still acts like a demand router for huge parts of the economy. Travel startups, SaaS tools, marketplaces, agencies, local services, publishers, affiliate businesses, e-commerce brands, and solo consultants all depend on discoverability. If regulation makes search more fragmented without creating real alternatives, then smaller players get the downside twice.

• They still depend on Google, because no new search rival has gained real mass.
• They face weaker conversion paths, because users hit more friction before reaching them.
• They must rebuild acquisition models, often without extra budget or bargaining power.
• They absorb policy whiplash, because interface shifts can affect traffic overnight.

As a founder, I care about the interface between policy and behavior. My work in game-based entrepreneurship taught me something simple: people do not act inside legal theory. They act inside screens, prompts, incentives, habits, and time pressure. If a user searching for a hotel, lawyer, plumber, or design tool needs more clicks to finish a task, many will not reward fairness. They will reward convenience. That is why laws that ignore behavioral design often miss their own target.

What does the evidence from 2024 to 2026 actually show?

The evidence is not perfect, and some sources come with a policy agenda. Still, the pattern across studies, working papers, industry reporting, and Commission action is too consistent to dismiss. The broad picture is this: consumer friction rose, business performance weakened in some verticals, and Google’s search dominance remains largely intact.

Consumer signals point to more friction

Search Engine Land’s March 2026 analysis by Luca Tagliaferro pulled together several widely cited data points. Among them were findings from Nextrade Group and ECIPE suggesting that many European users feel search tasks now take longer and require more clicks. In the reported results, about two-thirds of surveyed consumers said they needed more steps or more complex queries, and 61% of frequent searchers said searches took about 50% longer after the DMA changes. In travel, 42% of frequent travelers said flight and hotel search had worsened sharply.

Those are not tiny annoyances. For startups, every extra click in a commercial journey is a tax. If someone searching for “hotel in Paris with family room” or “best payroll software for freelancers” has to jump between modules, review sites, maps, and booking pages, a smaller brand loses momentum.

Academic evidence shows mixed but worrying outcomes

A 2026 CESifo working paper on the DMA’s impact on Google Maps examined what happened after Google removed clickable maps and direct Google Maps links for EU users on many location-based queries. The paper found that searches for “maps” and “google maps” rose by more than 21%. That sounds trivial until you think like a founder. People had to work around the search page to reach the service they already wanted. Even more striking, the paper says that despite this rise, there was little evidence that alternative map services gained durable traffic gains. Users mostly navigated back to Google.

That is the DMA problem in one sentence: more friction did not equal more competition.

Business metrics show damage in commercial search journeys

Industry groups and trade reporting have cited drops such as a 30% decline in click-through rates on Google Hotel Ads in DMA-affected regions and a 36% drop in direct hotel bookings through Google pathways. Those figures need healthy skepticism because they come from interested parties. Still, they fit the visible product changes in travel search, where stripped-down modules and more fragmented flows reduced convenience.

If you run a startup, a local business, or a niche marketplace, this matters because user behavior is path dependent. People often do not compare ten options with philosophical discipline. They take the shortest route that feels good enough. If law inserts friction without building trust in alternatives, then many commercial sessions simply decay.

Did the DMA solve Google’s self-preferencing problem?

Only partially, and often cosmetically. Europe did force Google to react. Search result pages changed in the EU. Some Google-owned units lost prominence or changed formatting. That matters. I do not want to pretend nothing happened. But if your benchmark is real contestability, then the answer still looks like no.

Google can still redesign the search journey faster than regulators can evaluate it. It controls the search engine, the ranking systems, massive user data, browser distribution, Android defaults, and many destination properties. The DMA tried to discipline conduct inside that system. It did not remove the system’s centrality.

• Before DMA: Google could directly favor its own vertical products in search.
• After DMA: Google had to change display and treatment rules in Europe.
• Still true in 2026: Google remains the starting point for the vast majority of searches.
• Net effect: interface changes happened faster than market structure changed.

This is exactly why I often say regulation should be invisible inside workflows, not theatrical on top of them. At CADChain, my deeptech company, I have spent years thinking about compliance inside tools. If compliance forces users into clumsy behavior, users resist or route around it. The same logic applies here. Search fairness cannot just be a visible rearrangement of boxes.

What is the European Commission doing in 2026?

The Commission is not blind to the problem. In early 2026 it opened proceedings to help Google comply with interoperability and online search data-sharing obligations. In April, the Commission published preliminary findings and proposed measures requiring Google to share ranking, query, click, and view data with third-party search engines on fair and non-discriminatory terms. You can read the official announcement in the European Commission’s 2026 press release on Google search data sharing under the DMA.

This is one of the most important developments in the whole search debate. Why? Because data access, not just page formatting, may shape whether rivals can improve results. The Commission’s logic is simple. If Google’s rivals can access richer search data, they may be better placed to tune their own engines and become more useful.

Still, even this remedy has limits:

• It arrives after years of market concentration.
• It may help specialist engines more than general search rivals.
• It does not solve defaults, brand habit, or product bundling.
• It may be too slow relative to the shift toward AI answer engines.

Some critics, such as the ITIF comments on the Commission’s proposed Google search data-sharing measures, argue that search is already facing pressure from AI entrants and that more DMA intervention may be unnecessary or harmful. I disagree with parts of that critique, but the timing point matters. Regulators are still calibrating rules for classic search while the market races toward AI-mediated discovery.

Why is AI making the DMA look older than it is?

Because search has already moved from page ranking to answer orchestration. That shift changes everything. If the old fight was about whether Google Flights or Kayak appears above the fold, the new fight is about whether an AI summary removes the click altogether. The DMA was built for a world where traffic flowed through visible ranking positions. AI search turns ranking into synthesis, citation, summarization, and hidden source selection.

That is why Tagliaferro’s point in Search Engine Land hits so hard. Google launched AI Overviews in Europe just as regulators were still battling over self-preferencing mechanics in traditional search. The market moved to the next interface. Founders know this pattern well. You prepare for one gate, and the gatekeeper builds a new gate.

For entrepreneurs, the practical warning is blunt:

• Do not build a company on a single search surface.
• Do not assume legal wins create customer flow.
• Do not confuse visibility on the page with bargaining power in the market.

I build systems for founders, and one of my operating beliefs is that small teams need infrastructure, not inspiration. In search dependence, infrastructure means first-party audience, repeat demand, brand memory, direct channels, email, communities, and product hooks that make users come back without asking Google for permission each time.

What are the biggest mistakes founders make when reading this story?

I see at least five recurring mistakes.

1. They assume regulation will save them.
   Law can restrain abuse, but it rarely builds demand for you.
2. They confuse anti-Google sentiment with a go-to-market plan.
   Being harmed by a gatekeeper does not make your business discoverable.
3. They rely on one acquisition channel.
   That is not a marketing plan. That is dependency.
4. They ignore interface economics.
   Clicks, friction, default behavior, and query reformulation all shape conversion.
5. They wait too long to build brand recall.
   If people search your category instead of your name, you are more exposed.

When I work with founders in Fe/male Switch, my startup game and incubator, I push them into slightly uncomfortable experiments. Talk to users. Test direct outreach. Run low-cost acquisition trials. Build a reason to be remembered. Safe theory rarely changes founder behavior. The DMA story proves the same point at market level. A prettier legal theory does not always change what people actually do on a screen.

How should entrepreneurs adapt if fairer search is failing?

Let’s break it down into a founder playbook. If your business gets leads from search, treat 2026 as a risk management moment.

1. Audit your search dependence

Measure how much of your pipeline comes from search, and split it by intent type.

• Branded queries
• Non-branded commercial queries
• Local discovery queries
• Comparison and review queries
• Informational top-of-funnel traffic

If more than half your demand starts with non-branded Google search, you have gatekeeper exposure.

2. Build direct demand before you need it

This means email lists, webinars, founder-led content, communities, referrals, partnerships, podcasts, and product loops. Many founders delay this because search feels cheaper. It is cheap until the page changes.

3. Design for query loss

Ask a painful question: what if AI summaries answer the query without sending the click? Then build assets that still matter. Think calculators, templates, proprietary data, niche communities, specialist trust, live support, and category education tied to your brand.

4. Own your niche entities

Semantic search and AI retrieval reward entity clarity. Make your company strongly associated with a focused set of topics. If you serve freelance accountants in Germany, remote HR teams in the Nordics, or 3D printing compliance for SMEs, make that association unmistakable across your site, content, customer stories, and product messaging.

5. Test alternative discovery channels aggressively

Try YouTube, LinkedIn, Reddit, newsletters, niche directories, B2B communities, local associations, and partner referrals. I am a big believer in structured experimentation. Small, cheap tests beat strategic fantasies. That principle has served me far better than waiting for top-down systems to become fair.

What should regulators do if they actually want fairer search?

I am not a regulator, but I am a founder who has built in Europe long enough to know the difference between a rule that looks elegant and a system that changes incentives. If Europe wants real competition in search, it needs to think beyond surface neutrality.

• Go after structural power, not just page design.
  That means looking at defaults, browser control, Android distribution, and the links between search, ads, and owned verticals.
• Push harder on portability and switching.
  If users cannot move history, preferences, and context easily, rivals remain weaker.
• Treat AI search as part of the same competition problem.
  Do not regulate 2024 pages while 2027 answers are already replacing them.
• Measure outcomes for users and small businesses, not just formal compliance.
  If search takes longer and rivals still do not gain share, something is off.
• Shorten enforcement cycles.
  A remedy that lands after the market has shifted is often a museum piece.

The Commission’s search data-sharing action is a step toward something more structural, because data matters. You can also see the official thread of this effort in reporting such as coverage of the Commission’s Google search data-sharing measures and summaries like European Interest’s report on the Commission’s Google DMA investigation. Still, Europe may need stronger medicine than compliance choreography.

What is the founder lesson from Google Maps, Google Hotels, and local search?

The lesson is brutal and useful at the same time. Distribution control beats feature quality for longer than founders want to believe. Many startups assume that if their product is better, markets will self-correct. Search history says otherwise. Better specialist tools can still lose if the gatekeeper owns the default path.

That should change how you build.

• Build products with repeat use, not one-off discovery dependence.
• Capture customer relationships the first time they arrive.
• Create reasons for direct return, such as saved workflows, memberships, dashboards, or alerts.
• Use content to build category authority tied to your brand name.
• Prepare for policy shifts, not just algorithm shifts.

As someone who runs ventures in parallel, I think in systems. Parallel entrepreneurship teaches you to reuse channels, assets, communities, and knowledge across products. That same systems thinking helps here. A business that relies on one fragile acquisition mechanism is not lean. It is exposed.

Could the DMA still succeed, or is the promise already broken?

I would not call it dead. I would call it underpowered for the market it tried to fix. The DMA did one thing that matters. It stated clearly that gatekeepers should not be free to weaponize their control over adjacent markets. That principle is right. The trouble is that principles do not win against distribution physics by themselves.

The 2026 review cycle may still produce tougher remedies. Search data sharing could help some rivals. New AI-era rules could close part of the gap. Antitrust cases outside Europe, including in the United States, may also shape what is politically possible. Still, founders should not bet their company on future legal perfection.

My advice is simple. Read regulation closely. Respect it. Never outsource your survival to it.

What should you do next if your business depends on search?

1. Map your exposure. Know which products, pages, and queries depend most on Google search and local modules.
2. Increase branded demand. Make people search for your company name, not just your category.
3. Build first-party assets. Email, community, repeat-use features, and direct traffic matter more than ever.
4. Track commercial friction. Watch click paths, conversions, and drop-off after search page changes in the EU.
5. Prepare for AI answer loss. Assume some queries will stop sending traffic and build value beyond the click.
6. Diversify discovery. Partnerships, niche media, events, referrals, creator channels, and social search should all be tested.

If you are a founder, freelancer, or small business owner in Europe, this is your wake-up call. The DMA promised fairer search. So far, it has mostly delivered a messier route through the same gate. That means your advantage will not come from waiting for fairness. It will come from building resilience. In my world, that is what infrastructure looks like. Not slogans. Not hope. Systems that let you survive when the page changes again.

And it will change again.

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FAQ

Why should founders care about the Digital Markets Act if they rely on search traffic?

If your pipeline depends on Google Search, Maps, Hotels, or Shopping, DMA-related interface shifts can reduce clicks and conversions overnight. Founders should treat this as a channel-risk issue and diversify acquisition early. Explore SEO for startup resilience and read the DMA search failure analysis.

Has the DMA actually made Google Search fairer for startups and small businesses?

Only partly. The DMA changed how results are displayed, but it has not materially reduced Google’s gatekeeper role in search distribution. For startups, that means less certainty without clear new winners. See the European startup playbook for risk planning and review Intereconomics on DMA enforcement challenges.

What evidence suggests search got worse after DMA enforcement?

Multiple reports cited in 2025, 2026 point to more clicks, slower searches, and weaker travel-search journeys for EU users. That added friction hurts startup discoverability and conversion rates. Use Google Analytics to monitor traffic changes and see reported user-friction findings in Search Engine Land.

Did alternative search or map services gain from Google’s DMA changes?

Not much. A 2026 CESifo working paper found that removing direct Google Maps paths increased “maps” and “google maps” searches by over 21%, but rivals did not gain durable traffic. Track search exposure with Search Console and review the Google Maps DMA working paper.

How does the DMA affect hotels, travel startups, and local businesses?

Travel and local search appear especially exposed because users face more fragmented booking and discovery flows. That can lower direct bookings and ad click-through rates for smaller operators. Strengthen paid acquisition with Google Ads for startups and see Google’s critique of DMA travel impacts.

What is the European Commission doing in 2026 to improve competition in search?

The Commission proposed measures requiring Google to share ranking, query, click, and view data with third-party search engines on fair terms. This could help rivals improve quality, though likely slowly. Build data-driven growth systems with AI automations and read the Commission’s Google search data-sharing proposal.

Why does AI search make the DMA look outdated so quickly?

The DMA was built around visible rankings and self-preferencing on classic search pages, while AI search increasingly answers queries directly. Startups should prepare for fewer clicks and more zero-click discovery. Adapt with AI SEO for startups and see TechPolicy.Press on the first DMA review and AI limits.

What are the biggest mistakes founders make when reacting to DMA-related search changes?

The main mistakes are waiting for regulation to fix demand, relying on one channel, and ignoring branded search. Founders should build direct demand, email lists, partnerships, and repeat-use features. Use the bootstrapping startup playbook for channel discipline and read POLITICO on user frustration with DMA-era search.

How can startups reduce dependence on Google if fairer search is not working?

Start by auditing branded versus non-branded traffic, then expand into email, communities, referrals, LinkedIn, YouTube, and niche directories. The goal is resilient first-party demand, not pure SEO dependence. Build alternative reach with LinkedIn for startups and review official DMA progress in the 2026 Commission report.

What should founders do right now if EU search visibility is critical to revenue?

Measure exposure by query type, monitor EU click paths weekly, and prepare for AI answer loss in both organic and commercial search. Pair SEO with paid, partnerships, and owned audiences. Create a balanced acquisition mix with PPC for startups and see the Commission investigation summary on Google DMA compliance.

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