Help me buy a mobile phone please!

[downwifthekidz100]

Haven’t really had a mobile phone since the 90’s. I use a laptop and iPad to message or FaceTime or whatever and a landline for calls ( people call he actually.Everyone is emailed or messaged).
It’s impossible now to do banking or log in to stuff without one, so I’m going to have to get one.
Literally no idea where to start.
I tried a burner phone with GIfGaf PAYG but the phone was useless and I promptly lost it .GIfGF took £10 a month when I didn’t use it as there was no way of cancelling without a phone
Anyway.
What phone ; secondhand, contract? Cheapest / easiest way of getting a phone I can use but doesn’t cost me fortune every month. Is tying yourself in worth it?
Please help. There’s so many options.

I just got samsung s20 fe , unlimited everything for £26 a month from mobile ID .

It's not the very latest which are £££ but it will be able to cope with updates for a good while.

Very simple to use.

Apparently, handsets are much of a muchness these days do you certainly don't need the latest model, dim only deals are good, ee has the best network. You can switch easily, if you have the phone it is very cheap, I was with ee but recently switched to Vodafone, I get 15gb data month and unlimited texts and calls in the UK for £8 a month. Sadly the days when European roaming costs were the same have gone despite, operators saying they wouldn't do this. It is also very easy to switch between operators.

Thanks!
Operators are networks yes? I think EE is the only one that works well in the area.
Best deals to get a secondhand phone from them, a mate or an independent like Tesco do you think?
Where do you get a Sim from. They sell them in Poundland to top up and I bought GIfGaf over the internet …expensive mistake as I didn’t use the phone.

£26 is as much as the landline/ internet a month! I couldn’t afford £50 for very little extra benefit.
Do you have land line or internet then? I feel I am missing something.

I'm on O2. My Samsung A21s is not fancy by modern standards but I have a 2 year contract at under a fiver a month. The phone contract is £18 a month but I get unlimited texts and calls and 5GB of data a month. I usually use it at home and work with WiFi so I never use up the 5GB.

We don't have a landline phone, only our broadband connection from a national provider. All the family are on O2 so we can call each other for free!

I hear Tesco Mobile is quite cheap. But surely you can do online banking on your laptop or iPad?

A Redmi Note 9 is £120 for the cheapest model and it's really very good. www.mi.com/uk/buy/product/redmi-note-9?gid=4202000037

If you have to be on the EE network PlusNet's cheapest SIM is £6 per month. PlusNet don't support short code numbers, which may be a good thing.

But surely you can do online banking on your laptop or iPad?

They only register you if you have a mobile phone. They need it to send verification codes.
One credit card will accept my landline but it’s the only one. Now I can’t even buy anything online with my card because of the verification code.Annoying.

We haven't had a landline for years , I was on £14 a month before my 7yo samsung turned up its toes. I play a lot of games online and wanted a good camera.