A US federal judge has rejected the Department of Justice's bid to force Google to sell off AdX, its online advertising exchange, dealing a significant blow to American antitrust enforcers' efforts to break up big tech firms. Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, Virginia, had previously found in April 2025 that Google held illegal monopolies over the ad server and exchange markets and had unlawfully tied publishers to AdX, but she has now decided against a forced sale, instead accepting most of the behavioural remedies proposed by both sides.

The justice department, backed by a coalition of states, had argued Google could not be trusted to run AdX fairly given its past conduct, while Google warned a forced sale would be technically fraught and disruptive to customers. AdX charges publishers a 20% fee on instant ad auctions, though it is a relatively minor part of Google's business, having accounted for 4.1% of revenue and 1.5% of operating profit in 2020. The decision marks the third consecutive setback for US regulators seeking break-ups of major tech firms, following similar rulings that spared Meta from divesting Instagram and WhatsApp, and Google from selling Chrome; antitrust cases against Amazon and Apple are not expected to reach trial before 2027.