A top court has largely rejected Google's appeal of a record European Union fine imposed for reducing consumer choice through the dominance of its mobile Android operating system.

It marks another win for EU regulators taking a global lead in controlling the power of big tech companies.

The European Court of Justice's General Court mostly confirmed a 2018 decision by the EU's executive Commission to slap Google with a fine of more than €4billion.

"In order to better reflect the gravity and duration of the infringement," it's appropriate to give Google a fine of €4.125billion, the court said. That's slightly lower than the original €4.34billion penalty, with the court saying its reasoning differed "in certain respects" from the commission's.

The fine is one of three antitrust penalties totalling more than €9billion that the European Commission slapped on Google between 2017 and 2019, putting the 27-nation bloc at the forefront of the global push to rein in tech giants.

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Since then, the commission has widened its crackdown on digital giants with more antitrust investigations targeting Amazon, Apple and Facebook and sweeping new rules aimed at clamping down on the biggest digital companies.

Tech companies are now facing tighter scrutiny around the world: Google also got hit with a €51million fine on Wednesday by South Korean privacy watchdogs that also fined Facebook parent Meta €22.2million.

In its original decision, the European Commission said Google's practices restrict competition and reduce choices for consumers by requiring smartphone makers to take a bundle of Google apps if they wanted any at all and prevented them from selling devices with altered versions of Android.

Google still has one more chance to appeal the decision - but only on points of law - to the EU Court of Justice, the bloc's highest court. It didn't say whether it would do so.