It's exactly like that, yes. I talked about the uselessness of demo platforms as a means of building your own strategy here: Is a demo account necessary for a beginner trader?
Indeed, the behavior of the demo mode and the real market is fundamentally different. In the real market, in addition to psychology and other live participants, there are also exchange bots, there are market makers who manipulate the price, but they are not in the demo mode. The crypto market is full of manipulation and various traps where bots hunt for stop losses and liquidations of most traders. All this must be taken into account when creating your trading strategy, and in the demo mode you can learn only the very basic principles of trading.
Therefore, I recommend that traders practice on a live account using a $5-10 deposit.