As a general purpose USB (which not only works great for daily use as a thumb drive but also works with no issues as Linux Live or persistent USB) I can recommend the Sandisk Ultra line. I had them everywhere from 16GB to 128GB. They never let me down. The housing might look like it’s made from flimsy plastic but it’s surprising sturdy.

A second drive I’m currently preparing for use as a persistent Linux drive is the Samsung portable SSD T7. It’s nice and sturdy and the USB C to USB C interface allows me to easily run it on my Laptop without using up any of my precious USB A ports.