Adafruit does have it tough; they try to bridge sites like Amazon and Digikey by having a very broad selection of products specific to electronics, but they don't actually have many parts in each of those categories. They focus more on supporting what they have with documentation and software and whatnot.
But sites like Digikey/Mouser/etc have searching down. If I want a capacitor, first I pick what kind (electrolytic, ceramic, tantalum, etc,) and then I am presented with dozens of menus representing specific attributes that I care about. Capacitance, temperature coefficient, size/pakaging, manufacturer- whatever you could possibly want to select on, you can.
Sometimes I wish that other digital distribution platforms would take inspiration from that 'catalog' model. Discovery is difficult, these days.
But sites like Digikey/Mouser/etc have searching down. If I want a capacitor, first I pick what kind (electrolytic, ceramic, tantalum, etc,) and then I am presented with dozens of menus representing specific attributes that I care about. Capacitance, temperature coefficient, size/pakaging, manufacturer- whatever you could possibly want to select on, you can.
Sometimes I wish that other digital distribution platforms would take inspiration from that 'catalog' model. Discovery is difficult, these days.