I don't want to constantly be buffing and polishing the car. I don't want to eat away at the clear coat and I don't want to spend the time every other month or every couple months with that. I had paint correction done at my detailer the day I got the car delivered, PPF locks that in for me.
Partial is basically invisible. If your detailer is running directly across the hood, find a new guy. Any good shop will wrap around the edges so you don't even see it. On my Model 3 I couldn't tell the front end was covered in PPF at all.
It only takes a couple rocks chips to personally bug me... hell, one good one that you can notice when walking up to the car would bug me. Might never get a rock chip with the car... or maybe it happens in the first few months. Maybe it happens on average once a year. Do you deal with the hassle of repainting the bumper every year? Even if the cost still balanced out, I wouldn't want to be without the car that much, or hell, deal with driving to a shop once a year.
Most PPF makers claim that it's fine to put ceramic on top of the PPF, some are even starting to make their own ceramic coatings. Maybe it doesn't bond as well to the PPF and only lasts for a year or two. Usually if you're getting full PPF the ceramic add on is minimal in price... often even included. It adds some gloss and shine and makes it even easier to wash. I look at it as 100% a cosmetic booster when applied to PPF.
I hate swirls so I opted to have the whole car paint corrected and then covered entirely in PPF. Where I live you'll often get a very fine coating of sand blown onto the car in the summer. It almost looks like a light layer of dust on the car, but it actually is grains of sand and 100% will swirl and scratch the paint. Even a good two bucket method seems to result in some very slight swirls when I do it. Maybe I need more microfiber towels and be swapping them out as well as using two bucket. Either way, it's easier and faster to wash the car when covered in PPF (for me) and allows it to be an enjoyable hour rather than half a day event with a lot of setup/clean up and a BUNCH of products and towels. I'm a couple buckets, foam cannon, and a handful of microfiber and done. Maybe if I'm feeling crazy I'll top it up with a retail ceramic spray that literally takes 20 minutes for the whole car and adds some gloss but only lasts a month or two but that's it.
For me PPF is ease of ownership while keeping the car looking dang near perfect. Maybe white would be more forgiving, but even on the blue swirls would show up at night under lights and in direct sun. I parked next to a nice expensive Range Rover at work yesterday and thought it looked great in black until I got close and it was COVERED in swirls. Like seriously looked like a kid had screwed up the whole car... but it was the telltale swirl marks from washing/drying, not a kid playing with a hot wheel running it over the paint or something...
