All goggle programs required?

Depends on the phone and the network (if you bought through a network): some apps cannot be removed. If you go to Settings .. Apps .. All you can go through the apps and uninstall any where the Uninstall button is not greyed out.

There are ways to remove the other apps, but they require Rooting (getting admin access to your device). See the rooting section for your device's sub-forum for more information. Note that rooting may affect your warranty.

You have to be careful removing Google 'apps' though, as some are required to make the phone work: large chunks of functionality that would normally be part of an operating system are now provided via apps as this allows Google to provide new functionality even when the manufacturer refuses to roll out operating system upgrades.

Personally, I find most Google apps quite useful and they're generally pretty good, though I don't bother with some - e.g. Google+, hangouts.

 

welcome to the forums ...

depends what google programs you are referring to...most are not required, but some are needed to make the phone work as designed...but none of them are actually required to make the open source version of android to run. (cyanogenMod, paranoid android etc). The amazon kindle, for example, runs a version of android that google apps are not installed and some can not even be manually installed.

 

Welcome to the forums GrandmaPot. I hardly ever update the Google programs. Dont use them that much and the way they came works fine. You can only remove them by rooting and that could void your warranty. Just make sure auto updates is turned off in the Play Store and you can ignore them.

 

Welcome to the forums

Typically it depends on you, whether you need the Google app or not. It is nice, however, that all Google apps sync to your account and if pulled up on a computer when logged into your account will show all the same information.

Hope this helps!