Ubuntu is nothing more than the Debian "unstable" branch with Canonical branding plus non-free packages. Compare https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution

Ubuntu is nothing more than the Debian "unstable" branch with Canonical branding plus non-free packages. Compare https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=debian https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=debian and https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=ubuntu https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=ubuntu and you will realize that all the freshness of Ubuntu is build on top of what is available in Debian unstable. I don't think this idea of "Debian packages are often very outdated" still applies nowadays. One can add "testing" or "backports" channels in your /etc/apt/sources.lists.d and get "upstream version" software. Even "stable" ships fresh enough software these days. In the last case you can always get the source, update it and send a nmu back to Debian. Lets not forget that that is how open source works :)