Just wait ... before long it'll be a smiley face for On, a frown for Off. After that, 'On' is accompanied by pschedelic-colored wavefronts crossing the page.

Is animation inherantly better ?

Many UI frameworks these days seem to think so.

I sure hope you're checking for prefersReducedMotion.

You can animate a check too, if you like animation. Gotta make it a stylized check while you're at it, instead of just a filled in box or an x

Absolutely, just google 'css animated checkboxes' and you'll get a tonne of solutions