To be clear: I'm not advocating for the use of `new` / `delete` over unique_ptr. But if you're creating a local object that never has to leave the current scope (or a member variable that's never moved in or out), there's no benefit to using a unique_ptr instead of creating the object directly on the stack or inline as part of your class, where the object's lifetime is bound to the scope, and your destructor is automatically run when its containing scope is cleaned up.

As an added bonus, you don't actually have to do a separate heap allocation.

I agree! You should use a regular object if possible, I’d never suggest otherwise. The rare exceptions I’ve run into are annoying initialization order issues (usually code that I didn’t have the time/knowledge/political credits to refactor) and large arrays that blow the stack.