I know, but that doesn't change the fact that other languages don't have templates and still have containers, meaning maps, vectors, etc.

They have simplified templates, aka generics.

The biggest difference is that templates are more expressive, allowing for compile time meta-programming.

I'd rather say templates are a hack to get generics in C++, because C++ lacks real generics contrary to eg. Java, C#, Haskell or Scala. Templates used as generics are limited in a way that the typechecker can't reason about generic types, only concrete types, which leads to horrendeous error messages and makes it impossible to prove generic library code type-safety. Type templates are templates, not types.

On the other hand templates used as a metaprogramming tool fall behind any modern macro system.

Rust is getting there but still lacks type-level integers, and macros are waiting for macros 2.0. It would also be neat to have the ability to run any function at compile time, but I don't think that's in the cards.

True, but as someone that spends the majority of his programming time between Java and C#, with C++ only when required, I do miss their power.

Also it is way better with latest standard improvements.

Sure, and those without templates, or at least generics, aren't type-safe.