OK if not Access, then what?

As a regular listener - at least in the last almost year now - I've heard fun comments around MS Access...but more seriously, what would be today's (ideally open source, or at least better) equivalent?  I assume whatever it might be would be just some sort of GUI layer over Sqlite, right?  I mean, if a family member, no scratch that...if a non-dev friend would ask me about a modern-day replacement/alternative for MS Access...what should I be recommending?  (Please don't say low-code platforms like ReTool, because that feels like too much commitment.  :-)

Love the show; keep up the great work!
Mars Xray