My favorite weight loss exercise is existing but being very cold. Not even joking. That’s the whole thing.
If you want to balance calories with low effort, expose yourself to whatever temperature you shiver at (cold water is great for this because you lose heat 25x faster when wet). You burn an absolute ton of calories for heat, and recruit beige fat cells to function as brown fat cells which exist only to burn through fat to maintain homeostasis. The more you shiver, the more effective you are at ambient calorie burn when you don’t shiver.
Cardio is wonderful for upping your overall metabolism, as is building any muscle. They also both work to strengthen your overall system. Do those things. They are good for you.
But for pure calorie balancing and deficits, cold wins hands down as far as effort involved. Because it’s just sitting there being uncomfortable, and that’s easy, some of us are that way always :)