It's the same as it's always been: Buy whatever your friends have

My honest view on smartphones is buy a phone based on your taste and preference not others. I personality pick Sony phones over other brands but two main problems first they don't buy their phone in the middle east and second, they've lost the phone market to other brands, I even forgot that Sony makes phones due to extremely poor marketing. I see a Samsung Galaxy in the hands of everyone I deal with, which makes me avoid buying Samsung phones. But on the other hand, Samsung provides decent service for their phones for a long period of time, plus quality battery life and camera. Xiaomi is not bad choose if you go for their flagship, cheap and affordable option to other brands.
In the end, you will buy one of these four phones: 1 - iPhone 16 Pro Max 2-OnePlus 13 3- Galaxy S25 Ultra 4-Google Pixel 9 This is because of their marketing and the market monopoly for their products.