Fucking hate this trend so much. My Pixel 8 is an absolute dogshit phone compared to my Pixel 2 for the same reason. Phones are giant now, impossible to use with one hand anymore, and slide off of fucking everything because they don't lie flat, and are uncomfortable to hold with how top-heavy they are too. I wish phone design would have stagnated, about 10 years ago. A phone's form factor did not need innovating! It was already perfect!
If you've got one device for all your computing then you want something more capable, I think there's more scope for variation is when it's in conjunction with another device, mobile plus your choice of watch/tablet/laptop/desktop/etc. that doesn't necessarily have to be on your person or quickly accessible, task dependent.
I recently booted up an old Samsung S10, and the size is just chef's kiss.