Share your experience!
I just received the update (Spain).
For now, everything seems to work fine, although I absolutely hate the lack of transparency on the notification, app switching and lock pattern screens. The background is just a shade of solid gray. Sadly, it seems to be an intentional design decision from Google's Material You and not a fixable bug as far as I can tell.
Also updated today (UK) and agree with everything you've highlighted, especially the notifications.
My biggest annoyance is the app group colour which has now changed to white and I am unable to find anyway of changing it:
It can be done by switching to the Dark Theme but that then has an impact on certain apps and other display settings which I don't want.
Tried everything else so any suggestions greatly received!
Try another launcher, for example Nova Launcher?
You can also try to go to Settings -Apps - Xperia Home - Storage - Manage Space - select OK followed by a hard reset by holding the power and Volume+ at the same time, then check the performance again.