To minimize taxes, you want your taxable accounts to be more weighted towards things that don't produce high short term capital gains and dividends, because those things will generally be taxed at higher rates, and sooner, than gains that are treated as long term capital gains. Yes, things with a lot of turnover will produce short term capital gains, and REIT funds are generally going to have high dividend rates, so those are examples of things that might be better off in a tax advantaged account where you don't pay the taxes until later (in traditional 401k/IRAs) or ever (in Roth 401k/IRAs). Bond funds would be another example since they pay regular interest income every year.
Index funds work pretty well in taxable accounts, since the makeup of the index doesn't change very frequently, so the fund itself doesn't often sell shares except when you do. The exception might be an index fund that is specifically designed for income, high dividends, etc.
If you have a very high income and are in one of the very highest tax brackets, there are also some funds that are specifically designed to minimize taxes (tax managed portfolios would be a term to search for), but if you're not in those really high tax brackets it's probably not worth it over a straight index fund. Another exception would be if you were going to invest in a municipal bond or muni bond fund, which pays tax free interest--since there would be no taxes, it would be better to hold those in a taxable account and put something else in the tax advantaged account. That's another type of investment that makes more sense for those paying very high tax rates.
