My own experience has been the opposite. Early versions of OS/X were dire, things like a kernel panic when removing an already ejected USB stick.
People like to point at Snow Leopard as being the peak of reliability but there are two things to consider about that. The first is that the previous versions were so bad that they had to stop creating new features and do a bug fix only release. The other is that it still needed countless updates through the following year.
If you want an example of something they have done exceptionally well take a look at the rollout of APFS on the iPhone. They replaced the filing system on millions of phones with barely a murmur from the community.
I think you are correct, people like to whinge (especially here).
People like to point at Snow Leopard as being the peak of reliability but there are two things to consider about that. The first is that the previous versions were so bad that they had to stop creating new features and do a bug fix only release. The other is that it still needed countless updates through the following year.
If you want an example of something they have done exceptionally well take a look at the rollout of APFS on the iPhone. They replaced the filing system on millions of phones with barely a murmur from the community.
I think you are correct, people like to whinge (especially here).