Sometimes 3s will pass before I even see anything after I've already typed in my search term (I'm always searching for a local app btw - it's how I open apps).
It's like it waits on an http request for every keystroke.
Also, you used to be able to search for an app in any of the secondary languages you have in your settings. Which is great because apps have different names in different languages (Settings vs Configuración vs Réglages), so it would be annoying to have to remember which word to search based on which language is primary. For years it would show you multilingual results (e.g. you can search for "Settings" as long as English is one of your secondary iPhone languages yet "Configuración" or "Réglages" would still show up).
It was the sort of polish I came to expect from Apple. Well, that stopped working a couple years ago.