How much time do you have to read? This is my personal experience with PPF (paint protection film) and my opinion.
I had a vehicle with PPF in the past it was great, XPEL is the brand and what drew me to this brand was the “self healing” properties. It worked and it worked great until I let some bird poop sit for too long and stain it. Never had a rock chip tear through the film otherwise and it has some great hydrophobic properties.
I recently had my Trail Boss done. After looking online I found a site that had precut kits from XPEL for partial hood, partial fender, grill, headlights and mirrors for about 650 shipped i believe. I’ve done flat applications on door sill and door cup before but nothing g like body lines. I called and shopped around and let me tell you people wanted an arm and a leg, for the aforementioned protection 2k,3k and 3.5k was what I found. If I wanted full hood go ahead and up it another 1k. I finally found a place in the Bay Area with great reviews and paid $1,500 for full hood, bumper, headlights, grill and mirrors, with lifetime protection/replacement coverage from the guy. I can barely see the lines unless I’m looking for the imperfections.
Ceramic Coating could be had for the price of the bottle and your own time, think some range from 80-150? Time wise you’re looking at I believe the dude from Texas on YouTube stated it was like 3 days worth of his time. If you have it applied it could be expensive as well anywhere between 1500-3000 depending on your paint now. They detail it and even correct the paint prior to throwing on the ceramic coating.
The difference in the two depends on your usage? Ceramic Coating will make easy work of bug guts and road grime, not so much rock chips.
PPF will give protection to road hazards against damaging your paint. I don’t know how true it is but I was once told a motorist hit a lawn mower on freeway it cracked the grill but the the bumper stayed in tact and they just replaced the film only. Again idk how true this is. I can tell you I will likely always do PPF.
If you want to play around with DIYer water/grime repellant I suggest Turtle wax hybrid pro graphene infused flex series it’s forgiving on application unlike ceramic coating if it’s your first time.
