During Covid, I did some digital cleaning. It took me around a month (from couple of minutes, up to few hours each day) to clean up my gmail inbox. I had a gmail label where I placed all the emails received from any site where I created an account. I went one by one to each of them and either changed the login (to a non gmail address), or deleted an account (if I wasn’t using it anymore).

Now I use another email provider, and i pay for it. I use gmail for situations/accounts where i suspect that my email address could be spammed. Right now, my whole google space usage is around 50 mb. I stopped using google drive, I don’t use google search, I still use YouTube and pay to have no ads - because I just like YouTube.

It’s possible to disconnect oneself from Google services as much as one wants. Still, I continue to use an android phone (I like iOS, but it’s still too limited in comparison to Android).

ADB is your friend. Uninstall any app you don’t need/want.

You can remove them. Tap the sticker icon on the right side of the text entry field (bottom of the screen). Scroll the bottom stickers’ bar to the right until you see the “+”. Tap it, et voila - you can remove them.

I wouldn’t be surprised if that would be exactly what they do.

I’ve read somewhere that once Gmail address is created, it is not reused - even when account is deleted.