Forcing users to take that extra step could cost Google market share in China, where it trails behind Baidu, the local search engine. But China experts said that the approach represents a pragmatic balancing of interests that lets both sides get some of what they want.

Xiao Qiang, director of the China Internet Project at the University of California, Berkeley, said that Google won because “they get their operating license. Chinese Internet users win because they can continue to access some Google services.”

But Mr. Xiao said the Chinese government also would win, because while it forced Google to move its search service out of China and barred it from automatically redirecting users to its uncensored Hong Kong-based search engine, it also got to show its own people and the outside world that it was willing to balance economic issues and censorship.

“It is unprecedented for a private company to challenge Chinese Internet censorship,” Mr. Xiao said. “In the past, there would have been no doubt that the Chinese government would have punished Google.” For the government, finding a way to keep Google in the country “is a very calculated position that is good for China’s long-term development and openness,” Mr. Xiao said.

While Google’s stand against Chinese government censorship earned Google the good will of free speech and human rights advocates, it also came at a cost.

Image Two office workers outside of Google’s head office in Beijing on Friday. Credit... Bobby Yip/Reuters

The compromise will allow Google to keep some of its business in China, but its position there may be weakened. In addition to potentially losing search traffic, Google could be hurting its ambition to expand into China’s booming mobile phone business. Some phone makers and network operators are introducing phones powered by Google’s Android software in China, but they have stripped out Google’s mobile search service from the devices and replaced it with rivals like Baidu. Google, which makes its money placing ads linked to search results, could face a limited audience for mobile advertising.