I understand that your point is that unique_ptr facilitates resource management. But the example you provide is a misleading. How is this supposed to compile? T

I understand that your point is that unique_ptr facilitates resource management. But the example you provide is a misleading. How is this supposed to compile? The deleter type is part of the unique_ptr. So you need something along these lines: auto scope_guard = [](void*) { }; unique_ptr<void, decltype(scope_guard)> finally{nullptr, scope_guard}; This is not very idiomatic. Something like toth mentioned makes more sense. If you want it to be efficient, use this: template <class Fun> class scope_guard { scope_guard() = delete; scope_guard(const scope_guard&) = delete; scope_guard& operator=(const scope_guard&) = delete; public: scope_guard(Fun f) : fun_(std::move(f)) {} ~scope_guard() { fun_(); } private: Fun fun_; }; template <class Fun> scope_guard<Fun> make_scope_guard(Fun f) { return {std::move(f)}; } auto guard = make_scope_guard([] { cleanup(); }); The difference is: there's no indirection through std::function, so you save yourself a (potential) heap allocation.