… is it possible to do any kind of business and/or have regular conversations without having to use whatsapp as a main way of communication?
If you’d like you can say in what country you’re living.
I cannot. Brazil is entirely dependent on WhatsApp. I’d like to drop it, but then I wouldn’t be able to do a lot of things.
As someone in the USA, yes. I mostly use discord to message friends and sometimes Instagram if I have to (which is just as bad as Whatsapp but everyone uses it)
I rarely use SMS anymore unless both folk have RCS chat enabled.
UK here.
Business yes. Personal communication technically possible. Personal would be really frustrating and limiting as most people would expect a more rich messaging experience than SMS allows (photos, videos, voice notes etc).