The appImage is the program. If you don't keep it, you don't have the program.

I've used one or two tools that only distribute for my system as an appimage or as source code.

I can't always be bothered to set up a compilation environment or deal with removing dependencies.

I only use one or two regularly, but it's nice to have them integrated!

I prefer from the distro's repos, then source, then flatpack, then appimage. Sometimes you have to take what you can get!