I wonder if it isn't the FCC emission power thing. In theory, that shouldn't happen in the EU, but most of it is software limitations and I'm not sure they always bother implementing it.
I know someone who couldn't get a signal inside a building with a flagship Samsung model, yet literally the cheapest Xiaomi model worked flawlessly.
I had something similar happen with wi-fi repeaters. A NetGear model, not only did it work so-so, it started having occasional breakdowns, disconnecting and all that. A while later I also got a Mi model to provide wi-fi to a timelapse camera in the yard, and it worked flawlessly for casual use as well, despite being further away than the first one.
I digress, but, back in the day, there were some good-ish drones controlled via classic wi-fi, and the usual trick would be to get one of those cheap chinese usb stick repeaters, plug it into a powerbank, tell it via the app that it's in mainland China and use that to connect to the drone, and watch the usable range go from dozens to hundreds of meters.
That being said, most things today are manufactured at least in Asia, if not PRC, and smartphones have a tendency to be faster at internet/connectivity stuff for quite a while now, could be just that