Graeme wrote

Keep seeing stories regarding BT's planned switch off of analogue
phone lines in 2025 but, knowing little about telephony, and
having no particular interest in the subject, don't know what
this really means for the average home phone user.

Not a lot. This is already happening in Australia with the
VDSL2 service. All it means for the average home phone
user is that the landline phone is plugged into the modem
/router instead of the phone line and is a voip service.

The most obvious difference for the average home phone
user is that there is no longer a phone service during a mains
failure because the modem/router is no longer powered.
But that is no big deal because the mobile phone service
normally keeps working during a mains failure.

Some of the other broadband services like the FTTP service
has a backup battery in the modem/router which means
that the phone service continues during a mains failure
and with the VDSL2 service you are free to have your own
ups for the modem router if you want to go that route.

Thoughts?

I gave up on those, they just make my head hurt.