I like to manually update my OS packages through the command line. Mostly because I know the timing is right and I can restart afterwards. I also want to know which packages changed, where to expect improvements or potentially some breakage. None of this is fulfilled with the Gnome Software UI tool. It just makes my PinePhone user experience worse. So here is a way to just disable it:
mkdir -pv ~/.config/autostart && cp /etc/xdg/autostart/gnome-software-service.desktop ~/.config/autostart/
echo "X-GNOME-Autostart-enabled=false" >> ~/.config/autostart/gnome-software-service.desktop
dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/search-providers/disabled "['org.gnome.Software.desktop']"
dconf write /org/gnome/software/allow-updates false
dconf write /org/gnome/software/download-updates false
Kudos goes to this guide: How to disable Gnome Software autostart