Everything you said is correct.
But really all registrars boil down to two "types" the sub-$20/year ones (which are like 90% of the market) and then the $1K+/year ones which bundle in all kinds of brand protection products and domain protection stuff (e.g. Mark Monitor).
Neither Google or Name Cheap are different enough for price to be a deciding factor, but NameCheap has a better track record than Google in this specific space. GoDaddy is someone I wouldn't touch even if they were cheaper, I hate their bullshit (e.g. upsell, misleading checkout, misleading prices, etc).
If you could pay $5 extra a year and get better service, if it was a business website I'd definitely consider it, but for personal shit I wouldn't, and in general there is no way to spend just $5 or similar more a year and get any marked improvement.
The only thing which might be an upgrade is $12/year for the registrar and then $6~7 for Route53 on top. That's a nice improvement for an extra few bucks.