A have a 2016 Mazda3. The infotainment is useless, so I just leave it on the home page usually. I've ordered a CarPlay retrofit that uses the stock screen, wondering if the enabling/disabling behaviour will be the same it CarPlay.
The only saving grace of those is the ease of cleaning spills. Otherwise I completely agree with you and GP - how annoying it is that every physical button is now a clunky touch surface!