Outdoor planters used to mean a handful of terracotta pots from the garden center and maybe a half barrel someone's dad cut in half. That has shifted a lot in the last few years, with better materials doing the work terracotta and concrete used to do alone, lighter composites that look like stone or zinc without needing two people to move them, and more shapes built for balconies and stoops instead of just big yards. On the whole that is a good thing, because it means a rented apartment with a six foot balcony can do as much with planters now as a house with a real porch.
Where they suit best depends on what you are actually working with. A sunny front step wants something sturdy and upright that can take a real root system, a shaded side entrance does better with wider, shallower pots that will not sit soggy, and a small balcony benefits from anything that can double up through the seasons, spring bulbs giving way to something leafier by midsummer. The biggest mistake I see, and made myself with a pair of pots that looked perfectly reasonable in the store, is buying on looks and ending up with something too small for the plant to mature in, so you are repotting every single year instead of letting anything settle in. Measure the actual spot first, not just the plant you have in mind, and go up a size from what feels right, because pots almost always read smaller once they are sitting against a wall or a railing than they did next to a dozen others on a display shelf.
In terms of what they sit with, planters do a lot of quiet work alongside the obvious stuff, a doormat, house numbers, a bench or a couple of outdoor chairs. Pairing two matching pots either side of a door reads more finished than one oversized pot, even on a tight budget, and a single large planter works best when it has something at a different height nearby, a wall sconce, a mounted mailbox, so it is not just sitting there alone.
How they age depends entirely on material. Concrete and stone composites weather beautifully and actually look better after a winter outside, developing a bit of a patina I would never scrub off. Glazed ceramic can crack if water sits and freezes inside it, so bring it in or at least empty it before the first hard freeze. Plastic and resin fade faster than you would expect in full sun, usually within two or three summers.
If I were starting from nothing, I would pick a warm charcoal or weathered stone finish. It goes with brick, siding, any door color, and it never looks like it is trying too hard.
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