A flat top electric stove is better than gas

Hopefully this is okay since it isn't directly food, instead it is cooking hardware. Also please note: I think we can all agree that a traditional electric stove is the worst of the three. It has the downsides of both the other options. I am only trying to compare gas stoves to flat top electric stoves here.

I have a gas stove and all my friends seem to think it is the ultimate cooking experience. The main feature I hear again and again is that it instantly turns on and off. This is technically true, however it is misleading because it's still going to take time to warm up the pan when you turn it on, and the grates will still be hot for awhile after turning it off. Sure, even with that, I will concede that with gas, pans warm up faster (from off) and grates cool off faster compared to electric stoves. But it certainly isn't instant for the purposes of starting cooking and being safe to touch after.

However as a tradeoff for that minor upside, you have major downsides to gas.

First, cleaning sucks. Flat top electric you can just wipe down quickly with a sponge or wet paper towel once it's cool enough. No disassembly at all. With gas, you have to remove giant grates, and also the burners themselves. And you have to clean all the pieces which are all unevenly shaped. There are awkward corners to everything, especially where the stovetop meets the burners, that make a full clean difficult compared to a flat top electric stove.

Second, the maximum heat is much higher on flat top electric. Sure, it takes a while to get there, but putting that on high is way hotter than the max that has flames can get to. When I make a big stir fry, I feel like it takes much longer overall because I'm waiting for the liquids to cook off at max flame heat. Versus using electric it's way faster and sizzles way louder.

Third, kind of minor but you can't easily use a gas stove as extra counter space while not cooking since the grates are, well, grates. Flat top electric doubles as extra counter space when not in use since it's nice and flat.

Finally, gas is more expensive than electric. Kind of a no brainer. I'm paying more for gas. And it's overall a worse experience.