This is not true at all. Nvim has built-in LSP support now, there's a huge amount of plugins you can use that integrate with LSP and they work great. I even use ChatGPT inside my vim (check out this plugin: https://github.com/dpayne/CodeGPT.nvim). The smart select functionality you mention is trivial to implement and I bet there is a plugin for this (btw, try `dit` to "delete in tag", or `di(` to delete in bracket, etc...).
I will admit that you have to spend a lot of time to configure it to your liking, not everybody wants to and I understand that.
Honestly I feel like (n)vim is going through a renaissance period lately, check out streamers like ThePrimeagen or TjDevries for some great content on how to get started.