I will say out of the scenarios I definitely do #2 the most. There are two places on my commute where it is a massive benefit:

1. One place where there is a major curve in the highway, and the exit is right before the curve and the entrance is right after the curve. Cars always slow down on the highway for that curve to 1/4th the speed, but if you exit hop (as I call Scenario #2) you can almost maintain full speed until you have to merge back in. I take my final exit soon after that merge so I need to be in the right lane anyway so it works great for me. Sometimes if the curve traffic is really bad (like backed up past the exit bad) I will get off one exit before the curve exit, because that exit doesn't have a light either. Then I take two exit hops to get past the curve and merge back in after the massive line of curve traffic. It's just pure win either way, probably cuts 3-10 minutes off my commute depending on if I have to do one or two exit hops.

2. Another place has an exit right before a curve, and after that curve there is often traffic that I can't see. But the service road is on a hill next to the road, so I can get off, see if there is traffic after the curve via the high road, and if there isn't any traffic I get back on. If there is traffic I stay on the service road through the light to the next exit which is the one I need to take for real. That has saved me a decent amount of time in the past too.

I get that if everyone did that my tricks wouldn't work. But everyone doesn't (actually I wouldn't have figured it out without following a very aggressive BMW one day) and that is road all the same in my eyes.