Related to that lock screen "quirk", the latest UI/UX "feature" that bugs me no end is the fact that on Pixel phones you can't remove the Google search bar on the home screen... yet there is now a Gemini widget available that does much more useful things, so in order to use it, you'd have two full width horizontal bars on your home screen. I assume this is going to evolve with Android 16 releases, but it's a really dumb feature.
Use a custom launcher. I run Nova, and have for my last three phones, which means my interface stays consistent, and I never have to see the search bar.
My home page is a calendar that takes up 75% of the screen, and two rows of icons below.
