I went through a similar upgrade recently after my old RICs gave out. What surprised me most is how much progress has been made in the DSP side rather than just the hardware.

The big differentiator for me wasn’t the brand, but the quality of the automatic scene-classification and how fast it adapts between quiet → speech → noisy environments.

Phonak and Oticon both do this well, but if you haven't tried devices with real-time binaural processing and multi-band directionality, it's worth demoing a pair. The jump in music clarity and spatial cues is noticeable even for moderate loss.

Also, don’t underestimate how much the fitting + REM session matters - the same device can feel completely different depending on how thorough the audiologist is.