Seven weeks after Google replaced its free product grid with a shared Comparison Sites box across Europe, its own shopping service still appears far more often than any rival. New search data covering fourteen European markets puts Google Shopping ahead of the next-largest comparison service by sixteen to thirty-five times, and in more than nine out of ten result pages its products are still the ones shoppers see. The finding lands as the first hard measurement of whether the European Union’s Digital Markets Act remedy is actually opening product search to competition, and the early answer is that it has changed the layout far more than the outcome.
## The grid vanished overnight on 16 September
The Product Grid, built from Merchant Center feeds and product pages, stopped appearing in all fourteen markets BrightEdge tracks on 16 September, and the Comparison Sites section began the same day. Keyword counts fell 38 percent below the old baseline on day one, then stayed below it until 29 September before stepping back above the old level on 30 September.
Germany, Italy and Spain climbed to 108 to 111 percent of their baselines by 3 October, while Finland and Norway were about 14 and 6 percent below theirs on 13 October. BrightEdge cautions the counts measure volume, not whether the same keywords moved between sections, and part of the early dip may reflect the new section being collected in stages.
## Google Shopping leads the new box in every market
Across Germany, France, Spain and Italy, Google Shopping appears 16 to 35 times as often as the next-largest service, and 71 percent of Comparison Sites appearances land in the top four result positions. The share runs from 61 percent in France to 76 percent in Spain and Italy, so the box is premium space whichever service fills it.
BrightEdge also found that Google Shopping owns the same products in more than 94 percent of all search result pages it measured. The box was designed to give rival services a fair shot, but in practice the products shoppers see are still, overwhelmingly, the ones Google itself surfaces.
## Why the change happened
Google removed the grid to comply with a 23 July ruling from the European Commission, which found that Google favoured its own shopping, hotel, transport and sports results and fined it 460 million euros. A separate 430 million euro fine over Google Play brought the day’s total to 890 million euros.
Google disagreed with the ruling and told Reuters the changes were the largest reduction in quality of service in its 29-year search history. It was given 60 days to comply, and the 16 September switch landed inside that window, so the change is unlikely to reverse while the ruling stands.
## Our Read
The numbers tell a story the layout hides. The Commission’s remedy changed where products appear, not who shows them: shoppers now see a Comparison Sites box, but the products inside it are still Google’s in more than nine out of ten result pages.
For retailers, the practical lesson is to check which comparison service their Merchant Center account uses for free listings, because that single choice now decides whose box carries their products. BrightEdge’s own advice is blunt: select Google as that service unless you are required to do otherwise, since no rival comes close to its visibility in the box.
The question now is what Brussels does with this evidence. Google has made Europe-only search changes this year, including [dropping site-reputation penalties in the European Economic Area](https://geroundtable.com/google-drops-site-reputation-penalties-eea/), and [regulators elsewhere are pressing it on search fairness](https://geroundtable.com/turkey-orders-google-fair-ai-search/). If third-party services cannot gain share, the Commission may conclude the remedy needs strengthening, and that would put Google’s shopping layout back under scrutiny.
## Why It Matters
Product search is one of the largest shopping funnels in Europe, and the DMA was supposed to open it. If the first measured outcome shows Google still taking the premium space in nearly every result, merchants who bet on rival comparison services may be paying for visibility that never arrives.
Shoppers, meanwhile, keep seeing the same Google-led results the law was meant to diversify, and the question is spreading beyond classic search. Google now [mixes sponsored and organic shopping inside AI Mode](https://geroundtable.com/google-ai-mode-sponsored-organic-shopping/), so the same dominance question will soon be asked of its AI answers as well.
## Background
The Digital Markets Act has applied to Google as a designated gatekeeper since March 2024, and the Commission designated Google Search as a covered service in September 2023. The July ruling followed years of complaints from comparison services that Google gave its own shopping results richer formats and better placement than theirs.
Source: [BrightEdge’s analysis](https://www.brightedge.com/blog/eea-product-grid-google-shopping) and [Search Engine Roundtable’s report](https://www.seroundtable.com/google-shopping-eu-dma-42456.html)
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