Google has relaxed its subscription policy, no longer requiring news websites to provide users with three free articles per day or face less prominence in search results.

According to a CNBC news report, while Google has argued that its “first click free” policy would lead to a boost in subscriptions, many media companies – such as News Corp – have complained that their sales were suffering as a result.

This year, The Wall Street Journal, which is owned by News Corp, stopped following Google's policy, which lead to a drop in search rankings but an increase in subscriptions.

"Over the last year, we got clear indications that, yes, it was going to be important for publishers to grow subscription revenues," said Richard Gingras, Google's vice president of news.

Gingras added that with the number of news outlets with paywalls reaching an all-time high in the last year, it made sense for Google to start developing tools for them. So, from now on, publishers will be able to choose how many, if any, free articles they want to offer to the search engine’s users.

In addition, the company plans to launch free software for publishers that enables users to pay for content with credit card information that they've previously supplied to Google. A separate tool would give publishers data on how to maximize signups with personalized offers and online advertising. Google hasn't decided if it will charge a fee for this tool.

The company wants to facilitate fast purchases that could take as little as a single click, Gingras said. Customers' names and emails would be shared with the publishers.

"Google search is valuable because there's a rich ecosystem out there," Gingras said. "To the extent the web is healthy, that's very good for our core business. Our objective is not for this to be a new line of business."

Facebook is working on similar subscriber registration tools, while Apple released support for subscriptions within its News app last year.