Well yeah, I mean no one forces you to use Explorer for file management under Windows. I'm an old-time Norton Commander user, and when Windows came around I switched to Total Commander. There are open-source alternatives too, even cross-platform ones, like this one: https://doublecmd.sourceforge.io/.

That being said, no one forces you to use Windows either - except maybe your employer or the software you are using, but this is getting less and less of a problem fortunately (web apps, Proton etc.).