They are quite handy for some people. Once you get one, you'll start labeling all stuff. It's fun and also helps finding stuff faster.

Meanwhile once I bought a roll of blue painters' tape I started labeling freaking everything.

Painter’s tape is where I started, too… then I learned that gaffer’s tape comes in 1” rolls, and I’ve never looked back.

I went with the 47 mm wide roll of tape because that was the easiest to find on the shelf at the big box store. 3M painters tape because it will generally come off cleanly well past its rated time of like two weeks.

This is the way. Tape and a sharpie. No wires, drivers, usb, bluetooth, or wifi needed.

I assume part of the appeal is much cheaper label supplies than eg Epson?

The appeal is the ability to make decent labels which can withstand almost all indoor use and abuse for a reasonable amount of time.

I generally hand-label my boxes and things with specialized ink, and they hold very well even after a decade.

But if I'm going to label a spice jar or something gonna handled a lot, I use the printer. It's legible, resistant/resilient enough and reprinting things is easy.

I think part of it is that these printers end up offering so much more flexibility than your traditional labeler. Single-font single-line labels are boring, crummy built in excuses for emoji…