When I started soldering everything was big and had leads that went through holes in the board. You inserted the leads, bent them over to hold the component, flipped the board over, soldered everything, and trimmed off the excess leads.
Now I’m soldering things down to 0402 SMDs (1/4 the size of the smallest component in the picture) using a needle point soldering tip and a microscope.
A pair of 2N2222 transistors, one SOT23 and one TO-92.
I just do minor soldering with building ham radio antennas and power connectors. For the most part it’s easy stuff but every now and then I build a small, low power antenna matching unit and holy cow…
Things get silly at really small sizes.