Neither SMC nor price action is inherently better; the right choice depends on your strategy, market understanding, and how much institutional context you want layered into your reads.
Their use depends on the trader's strategy, market understanding, and comfort with the concepts, and integrating both can offer a comprehensive approach to market analysis.
Pure price action keeps things clean: candlesticks, structure, support and resistance. SMC adds order blocks, liquidity zones, and fair value gaps to explain why price moves. Price action offers a clean view of market structure, while SMC adds depth by connecting that structure to institutional behaviour.
Most consistent traders combine both.