I would say that the quality of any photos is based on three factors only one of which being the camera. Quality of equipment, photographers skill with that equipment (and photography concepts in general), and the difficulty of the shot (ambient lighting, distance, compliance of subject, etc.) I’m not surprised at the popularity of the bridge cameras. I think iNat makes people more interested in branching out with their observations. A bridge camera with an ample zoom can handle both a tiny insect on your hand and a far off bird in flight without having to fiddle with changing lenses. Getting a good photo of a wild bird with a cell phone would require a lot of luck I would think, unless it’s a dead bird.
I’m currently using a Panasonic FZ200 which I like pretty well, especially having the 2.8 aperture at full zoom. When it’s time to replace it I’ll likely look for something with 4k video, better focusing, and a better sensor though. I’m not really comfortable walking around with over a thousand dollars worth of equipment though, so that limits the choices a bit. When I picked out the FZ200 which has 24x zoom, I was also looking at the Canons with the 50x zoom. Some reviews said that having that level of zoom was too difficult to use hand held on cameras like these, as far as getting the framing right and not losing the subject. Do those of you with those cameras find that to be true?