Wire is a perfectly legitimate option. I'd only ask that you keep in mind that there are other privacy tradeoffs involved in using it.

Do you mind elaborating on those, or providing a link with more details?

Make a list of privacy-preserving things Signal does: the elaborate privacy scheme for user profiles, the special privacy proxy for GIF sharing, the envelope certificate trick they just introduced, &c.

Then go see what other messengers do to provide the same UX.

Depending on the messenger you pick, you will likely not have to give up your phone number, but you will leave the messenger operator with a log of everyone you've communicated with.

If I remember correctly, as a consequence, they store all of your unencrypted contacts on their server, or at least all of your unencrypted Wire contacts on their server. Unlike Signal, which stores nothing about you other than the date your account was created. That may be the "complexity" you're not understanding, in this case.

You do have to verify fingerprints individually for each device that a user has. You also have to do it individually for each device that you have.

Digression: anyone who's used Wire. How is there video/audio and more importantly conferencing software. Any good?