Please help me choose a laptop

A bit of back story. I have an iPhone (which iam typing this out on) it's not good for me. It's way to distracting from life. So at some point in the near future I will get rid of it. I have ordered a light phone.(I will try to leave a review here once I have used it for a while) and I want to get a laptop for my online usage such as permies, research, and hopefully some light video editing in the future. So what would be y'all's recommendation for a laptop that will 1. Last me a while. 2. Be reliable 3. Decently powerful. My budget would be about $1,200.
I have looked at the MacBook airs. Does anyone have experience with these or any other type of laptop. Thanks!!!

I am not a technic nerd and leave those things to my husband.
But recently I wanted to own my own laptop vs. family laptop, and I made a list of important things:
Reasonably big RAM and storage memory (wording?), several ports (USB is most important), and a big screen. I like to edit photos, I do translations and I like to work on my online genealogy tree. A smaller screen would be cumbersome and annoying.

Not important: Weight (mine is quite heavy).
Most important: Guarantee (two years) and sustainability. So I got mine from a young German company called Refurb that sells overhauled Laptops and other technical stuff. It is an HP, I couldn't even tell you the model number, not a totally recent one but works for me. Plus I have helped to save valuable material like rare earths and even got my own tree planted :-)

Anita Martin wrote: several ports (USB is most important)

I'd like to separate my wireless keyboard from my wireless mouse and have a couple extra for printers and what-have-you, so that makes 4 USB ports and an HDMI or two if possible so I can recline on the couch while enjoying y'all on my big screen tv.

There are (powered) USB-hubs, so one port can be enough.
My massive workstation laptop has 4 USB ports, I doubt most reasonably sized laptops have that many.

Silas,

A laptop is a surprisingly personal choice.  I recently purchased one to take to school so I can teach via Zoom (that’s right, I am required to be in my classroom to teach remotely, go figure).  In my case, portability was very important and this limited my overall screen size (15.6 inch) and demanded low weight.

Are you thinking about use as a portable computer or more of a desktop replacement.  A desktop replacement generally gets you more bang for the buck, but is also thicker and heavier.  Maybe this matters and maybe it doesn’t.  If you want to do video editing, I would go with as large a screen as you can afford.

My best suggestion is to shop around.  Years ago I used to like Dell as I could highly customize my own laptop build.  Sadly I can’t do that anymore, but I would compare specs between several major manufacturers (Dell, HP, Acer, Asus, etc.).  Getting 4 USB ports should not be a problem, but check places like Amazon and Newegg (good reviews there btw) to see what deals you can find.

Good luck and if you have a more specific question, please fire away.

Eric