Either and try-catch are basically the same thing, except try-catch is, as you say, baked into the language, while Either is just data, a value you can manipula

Either and try-catch are basically the same thing, except try-catch is, as you say, baked into the language, while Either is just data, a value you can manipulate however you want. Usually they will have the same functionality, but in some cases Either gives a few distinct advantages (off the top of my head): - You can work a list of Either values (Lefts and Rights). For example applying a readFile operation on a list of file paths can give you a list of Lefts (errors) or Rights, which you can handle later. I can't imagine doing that cleanly with try-catch (i.e. without building up some intermediate list). - Can return whatever data you want in the error, rather than just a String message (or, I guess you can if you write some custom CheckedException, but Either saves you from having to do that every time)