When it came to RPi’s, my default go to OS was Raspbian lite, thus no GUI. Which was very lite on resources and worked reasonably well for my needs.
I recently discovered DietPI which has made my life a lot easier as it has very nice interface whereby you can install or uninstall software packages, settings for the RPi, setup a VPN, Samba shares, web servers, db’s and the like on a RPi.
The added advantage of DietPI is that the OS is a minimal, thus very little to no bloatware on the OS. It only installs the needed modules/apps you choose and what is needed to run the OS. It also runs on most SBC’s out there and not just RPi’s.
Give it a try and see for yourself.