I've had the same strategy for buying both of the smart phones I've owned: I went to several review sites and deliberately ignored the #1 pick, knowing that the top pick is probably going to be some extremely biased or influenced choice. Looking at the next few on the list, I did some deep research on each one to make my own decision.
My first phone was really easy, because the #2 choice on almost every list was the LG G3. Everyone else was like "I LOVE APPLE SO I PICK THE IPHONE FOR NUMBER 1" or "I HATE APPLE SO I PICK GALAXY FOR NUMBER 1", but the #2 was always the LG. It turned out to be a great phone.
Now I've got my lovely little Pixel 3 XL, which I affectionately refer to as Pix. Now if only Google would stop being a butt and let me adjust the Google Assistant trigger to "
Help, Pix!" I'd be really happy.