Yes, you're absolutely right.

Right now I'm super interested in the Minimal Phone, and the SLEKE Phone, and to a lesser extent the Communicator (lesser of course because but for its wonky screen size, it can essentially 'do' everything a smartphone does). I understand the Minimal Phone's often clunky compromises and that it can also technically install any Android app but as you said, the amount of friction introduced by the e-ink screen is severe enough one would hope it would help. If I had to pick one to buy today, it would almost be the SLEKE phone, because to me the idea of simply perma-banning all the apps I struggle to keep deleted myself seems just about perfect, and they also have a Communicator-esque 'notification-forward' home screen with no icons trying to incentivize you to open apps just to pass time. The one and only thing holding me back is that because they've de-Googled the phone, they appear to have broken Android Auto, and in the spirit of not throwing the baby out with the bathwater, I'm not too proud to say I don't find GPS mapping to be a terrible drain on my life (even though it's increasingly used as a data point about a kind of thinking that has atrophied in our modern-age brains) and I simply will not give up its inclusion in my car. I know Garmin still exists, but...that's just a little too boutique, even for me. Any in-car mapping solution I've ever used short of Android Auto and Apple CarPlay has taken way too long to input or adjust destinations, been to quirky (I'm specifically thinking of a BMW I once borrowed and its awful built-in nav), and of course, AA and AC give you that 'single pane of glass' to manage not only your maps but also your music / podcasts / audiobooks through. I just can't give that up for a minimalist phone.

But if SLEKE can figure out how to add AA back in, I'd jump ship on my old iPhone the second my Clicks Power Keyboard arrives in the Spring.