Since before Apple used USB-C on the iPad, there have been third-party accessory manufacturers offering Lightning external storage for file transfers. Even so the Files application is still not very user friendly and finally with iPadOS 18 this will change.
iPadOS 18 will soon allow users to format external storage more easily. After this there is no more issue of connected external SSD cannot be opened due to different format. Apple appears to allow external storage to be formatted in three different formats namely APFS, ExFAT and MS-DOS (FAT). Apple recommends using APFS if users use Apple products extensively and using MS-DOS if they use PCs and cameras a lot.
This feature makes file management on iPadOS more efficient even though it is still far behind what Android has provided. Who knows in the future, Files on iPadOS will support the Mac Disc Ultility feature that supports the data recovery feature as well as First Aid. Let's all look forward to the stable version of iPadOS 18 which is expected to arrive in a few months.