For the same set of features, yes.

Nope. We went from sheet metal F-14s to composite F/A18E/F's (you really dont think the F-35 is new on that front, do you?). We went to a plane with significantly more computers and weapons hard points and systems.

And we cut maintenance in half.

The F-35 has decades of subsystem advances under its belt too. It's an incredibly smart jet.

And they still managed to make shitty design choices like not using fuel bladders. Which means any leak requires a fixing of the subframe which downs the jet for a long time.

Predictive maintenance? This just shows you how much marketing goes into this jet.

We have computer predictive maintenance on older jets. It's been a thing for decades. You just didnt know about it until LM started talking about it to make sure the F35 didnt get killed.

Guess what? That predictive maintenance isnt solving the actual implementation of the jet, which has been doing a LOT worse maintenance wise than was sold.