I'm a Google engineer who interacts a little bit with this kind of stuff.
There are a few settings for this kind of thing. You can take a look at https://myaccount.google.com/data-and-personalization
The "Ad personalization" bit is probably what the parent comment is referring to. But it sounds like you're interested in the "Web & App Activity" bit, which will turn off the non-ads usage of your data. To a certain extent at least, since there are some grey areas.
For example, I'm on the team that sends Google Shopping emails. If you click a button to track the price of a specific TV, we'll still send you an email if that price drops even if you've opted out of "Web & App Activity". But if you've just been browsing shopping pages for TVs, we won't send you a general email about TV deals if you've opted out. Both of those cases are in some literal sense "web activity" but it's still pretty clear what the user expects.
But you might imagine- if you're tracking the price of a specific TV and opted-out of Web & App Activity, should we send you an email if a near-identical TV drops in price? We probably wouldn't, and we don't have anything like this today, but it's not quite as clear. And Google has so many features across different teams, I can imagine there's probably at least one where some privacy reviewer made a different call than what you would have made.
There are a few settings for this kind of thing. You can take a look at https://myaccount.google.com/data-and-personalization
The "Ad personalization" bit is probably what the parent comment is referring to. But it sounds like you're interested in the "Web & App Activity" bit, which will turn off the non-ads usage of your data. To a certain extent at least, since there are some grey areas.
For example, I'm on the team that sends Google Shopping emails. If you click a button to track the price of a specific TV, we'll still send you an email if that price drops even if you've opted out of "Web & App Activity". But if you've just been browsing shopping pages for TVs, we won't send you a general email about TV deals if you've opted out. Both of those cases are in some literal sense "web activity" but it's still pretty clear what the user expects.
But you might imagine- if you're tracking the price of a specific TV and opted-out of Web & App Activity, should we send you an email if a near-identical TV drops in price? We probably wouldn't, and we don't have anything like this today, but it's not quite as clear. And Google has so many features across different teams, I can imagine there's probably at least one where some privacy reviewer made a different call than what you would have made.