[jeffe]

Why do you associate learning and diving deeply into topics exclusively with research? A phd program will only require you to dive deeply into your topic of research. You can get very far in many fields by reading through relevant texts and sci-hub papers.

In addition, even though their is a dearth of theoretical experience in industry, at FAANGs and similar you will find opportunities to learn a lot in areas such as systems design, networking, and machine learning from senior/principal engineers who are as savvy as professors, albeit with a practical lean.

Even the hands on aspect of a phd can be done on your own time with a little know how and income, see applied science[0] on youtube. Full time engineer who often tinkers and replicates scientific publications in his garage in his free time.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/c/AppliedScience/videos