I feel like I might be decently equipped to answer this. My house is older, I have no ceiling fans but I do like constant airflow especially sleeping.

I’ve went through a few models of tower fans and ran them virtually 24/7 and I think the one I have now has been my best choice.

I’ve tried a handful of vornado fans, months of use they begin getting louder, more noises start happening until the fan makes such noises that peaceful sleep or presence by them aren’t possible.

Vornado fans were nice, until they failed from use.

My current fan is a Dreo. It’s a tower fan but it uses a brushless motor which I didn’t think any of my other fans had. It’s been by far the quietest, which gives me confidence that it’ll last much longer too.

Might be worth considering: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09N3HKY79?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share

I would recommend getting an adjustable angle oscillating desk fan, but one made of metal (not much difference in price tbh) when you can unclip the front guard to access the blades.

That way you can wipe the dust off and give the spinning part a blast of WD40 once a year to keep it running nicely for a long time.

Something like this

For context about 30cm in diameter. Should cost around €25.

If you need the height but lack the table space a similar floor fan should do though will probably cost a bit more.

I know this sounds silly, but I once needed a cheap fan to blow away the farts in my computer corner (no air circulation there). It was ~€25 I guess (should be the same in $)

It’s a rotary fan, you can tilt the head and it’s oscillating.

I moved, but I took it with me and now it circulates the air in the living room.

7 years later this thing still rocks!

Here’s the label. It’s pretty quiet and built sturdy, despite being a plastic-bomber.

Aren’t basically all fans BiFL? They’re very simple devices, without much to go wrong. I’ve never had a fan, even base-budget home-brand department store ones, ever break, unless they fell over, or got hit enough to snap parts, but even BiFL things will break if you abuse them.

At most, the pedestal fans I’ve used wilt slightly, and that’s easily fixed by tightening the screw in the neck.