[Asooka]

Won't the object be destructed though? So while the memory for the object is kept, the memory for the object's heap-allocated members is not. I.e. if you have a 100mb string, after only weak references are left you won't have 100mb memory taken, but only sizeof(string) + sizeof(control block).

[nneonneo]

Depends on the object. As OP notes, `make_shared` with weak pointers is fine "if the base object has a relatively small memory footprint after it's been destructed".

There's lots of cases where the object itself is big, though. Think of objects with big fixed arrays, "god objects" with a bajillion pointers, or objects which themselves allocate data in-line.