I will discuss the rapidly-changing panorama of experiments seeking to measure the faint signals produced by keV and sub-keV nuclear recoils in radiation detectors. The initial interest in this area originated from searches for dark matter WIMPs, but has expanded with the demonstration of coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering. I will elaborate on the difficulties involved in understanding the response of detecting materials to this type of interaction, including some recent developments. I will also emphasize the opportunities for nuclear recoil detectors in areas beyond dark matter detection.