In practice though, unless you have some very specific needs (and the people I have met who thought that they did, well,... didn't :) ), you should still "just use CRA".

There are folks who like to live on the bleeding edge, and for those using something else (or ejecting) might even make sense... maybe. But for any production app you should just use CRA, otherwise you will find yourself explaining to your new hire all the obscure choices you made a year or two ago. Believe me, I've been on the receiving end of these explanations and it sucks.