> I think ranked choice is in that sweet spot where it is reasonably simple to use and simple to count.

"Ranked choice" is a range of methods and usually people mean instant-runoff. Recognizing that no system is perfect, I nonetheless have significant worries about instant runoff.

Imagine we have a society that's predominately split into two religions, where members of each religion would love a theocracy of their flavor, would settle for secular tolerance, and is vigorously (sometimes violently!) opposed to theocracy of another flavor.

If we have three candidates, one representing each of these positions, and everyone votes their true preferences then we see maybe 40% theocracy A, 40% theocracy B, 20% secular tolerance. The very first thing instant-runoff does is throw out the compromise, and we chose violence and strife.

If we generally believe that "a good compromise is when both parties are dissatisfied" then IRV will never choose a good compromise. I worry that that's a bad way of choosing what we do as a society.

I would really like to see open primaries with approval voting and the top two going to the general election. I think that is much simpler than RCV and I'm not convinced RCV would ever provide a better outcome.

It seems strange to give people worse election outcomes that they have to live with for 4 years at a time just to make their 5 minutes in the voting booth feel a little more pleasant.

Approval voting may not seem "fun", But thousands of voters have used it in Fargo and St Louis without any issue. All the evidence says it gets better results, is more resistant to strategic voting, and has a better chance of replacing the status quo.