I have an m1 pro 16gb and i can do fairly heavy development work with ease. It’s still a great machine and could even be overkill for what you are doing. Make sure you don’t get the 13" which has the touchbar and worse keyboard. I mean it could be worse but it’s still regarded as inferior afaik. Honestly it sounds like you could even go with the m1/m2 air.
For what you’re describing 24gb does sound like more than enough. I do much heavier tasks with only 16gb (m1 pro). The MBA doesn’t have a fan in it, so it cant cool as effectively as the pro and up models. If you noticed it getting hot then performance could have been throttled.
fwiw zoom runs like absolute trash on every mac I’ve used.