Email, docs, music, maps etc have reasonable alternatives and you don't depend on others to switch (a gmail user will receive my email from tuta). But with WhatsApp either you conceal and use it or you just don't talk to people (tried convincing them to switch to signal and it simply doesn't happen)

How do you deal with it?

It's a series of fallbacks. Eventually you're calling each other on the POTS like a couple of cave-people.

I don't, I deleted it. But to be fair I didn't use it that much in the first place. These days I mostly call friends or send them quick SMS, ask them if they wanna hang out tomorrow etc. Family and my best friend is on signal and I also have telegram if someone asks how they can reach me. Deleting WhatsApp wasn't that difficult for me but depending where you live it can be a struggle. Even schools, sportclubs and so on use WhatsApp exclusively which sucks.

I'd just delete it and see how things go. Reinstalling is easy if you feel you miss out too much.

All my friends went cold turkey when I canceled all
Facebook products two years ago. I switched to signal; some were using it already, some followed me, some use both. Screw the rest; they can use SMS, or snail mail, it turns out they were unreflective jerks to begin with. Culling is always refreshing. Admittedly, with signal being USA based, I will probably switch to a EU service soon, so the fun starts all over 🤪

I make like-minded friends. They don't use WhatsApp either.

I managed to do a surprisingly good job convincing a decent chunk of my friends to move over to signal several years back and they've mostly stayed. I still have WhatsApp but it's a much more secondary chat app for me now days.

Its easy. I have never used WhatsApp. I refuse to install or use any meta apps.

Everyone I talk to regularily has Signal or Discord (yes i know I would prefer Matrix or something), basically the only reason I have WhatsApp is one or two group chats I don't read.

I've only met one person who actually uses Whatsapp before and asked me to download it. My mom just asked me if I knew what it was 2 months ago because I guess it's popular on cruises. It certainly doesn't seem popular enough to have to deal with here at least

If Discord, why not WhatsApp?

I just don't talk to what Zuckerberg refers to as "dumb fucks"

It's seriously so self fulfilling. Markey mark made it so easy to not be a dumb fuck. It's literal actual written instructions on how to not be a dumb fuck. Millions fail the written instructions.

i patiently explain why i refuse to use it and then speak about the preferable alternatives

I use like five different messengers for different friend groups.
I wish I had the confidence and determination of my brother who singlehandedly forced my entire extended family to exclusively use Signal amongst each other
He basically blackmailed them lmao but it worked and after 1 month of adjusting noone complained

Don't use it. Refuse to talk with anyone that says they want me to use it. It's been working great.

Had to install and use an anonymous number that no one has for like 2 things that I was really in need to for interacting with some businesses though and for when many people were laid off in the company and that's where I needed to find some info.

Either I use Signal only or SMS which has worked great for many years. Now with RCS it's the same as any other internet based chat even with video calls.

I have a non gms ROM (e/os) I have shelter (work profile jail), and WhatsApp is living in the jail and doesn't see any contacts or rest of the phone.... I split my comms to (beeper for all texts that I don't care about for privacy that I can not get away from e..g LinkedIn/WhatsApp/g messenger but I have signal/briar that actually runs on the phone (non shelter). And I refuse to add them to beeper.

It takes time. I've been "indoctinating" my family fo years. And that really just means reinforcing things we all, "regular" people included, know about big tech. Part of that meant straight up telling them I wouldn't use anything other than Signal. That worked, and a few years later I now have my mom on Linux. Sometimes doing the right thing means being stubborn and putting your foot down

Edit: my parents have both become open source evangelists, and my mom has asked me more than once the difference between Free Software and oss. My parents are also both pretty conservative so it wasn't easy to turn them. But like I said. Put your foot down. Tell them you are doing the right thing, and if it comes to it, withold tech support 😂

Delta Chat

You can choose the relays yourself as its decentralised:

https://chatmail.at/relays

You're in a lucky part of the world. In my area, Whatsapp is used a lot for sharing attachments mainly, e.g sending a photo of a receipt for claiming warranty, contacting government officials, etc. People here do understand that if I say I don't use it, and even though they agree to use SMS and email, it still slightly annoys them as it is out of their norm. I am living by till now without Whatsapp, but it's really difficult.

!demeta@programming.dev crosspost candidate =)

I'm confused. If you want security, why do you prefer SMS to whatapp?

I am aware, I'd like to not have to use either. I'm trying to convince my friends to try out Matrix, but I haven't been successful yet.

Either all or nothing. But for certain not contributing to the destruction of humanity by using Meta products.

I have tried not using it and it is not worth it for me. The problem was not close friends. But everyone else including all other than my direct family if i don't have WhatsApp my family just send sms and at that point I thing WhatsApp is better at least its end to end encrypted. You also exclude your self form groups that get created at clubs/association(i don't know the English word).

I decide some time ago that my person life is more important that privacy because my mental health suffered because of stressing about privacy and cutting my self socially off to some extend by not using WhatsApp.

If you use android you can install it in a privet space or a second profile so it don't run all the time in the bagground.

Either enjoy the advantages of WhatsApp and be happy with the way it is. Or just don't use it.

conceal

I think you might've made a typo here, did you mean concede?

Yes, you give up if you want to talk to them. What else csn you do. Ten year campaign to switch everyone?

I use the Whatsapp Business app which allows me to be added to groups that I can’t avoid (kid’s class groups, kid’s soccer groups and my wifés family group) and to have an automatic message for people writing to me privately saying I won’t answer except if they write to me on Threema, Signal, iMessage, SMS or email.

With my own family and friends I only use Threema and Signal, even if I kind of lost or got further of some friends with my stance.

Still, I already don’t have enough time for myself, so I’m not looking to have more friends.

In my country, Whatsapp is almost everywhere, so I’m not don’t think I’ll be able to 100% leave it without sacrifizing some of my kids activities sadly..

TIL he calls the people that send their data to him "dumb fucks". But I don't get what instructions you are talking about? 🤔

I find not having friends helps with this

I’m stuck with WhatsApp because of exactly the things you listed (kids’ class groups, football groups, etc). I use Threema, iMessage or Nextcloud Chat with family and very close friends.

Naomi Brockwell TV on YT or Odyssey had a video about that, forgot the name. You basically make it more painful to communicate on other platforms, reward for using your preferred platform (e.g. offer tickets to a game through preferred platform).

Don't expect people to move completely, including close friends

you know Beeper? Might be really useful for you

hard to say, I don't use WhatsApp, i deleted it when FB bought it, yes, that long ago.

I use WhatsApp without any Android rights other than foreground data usage. I still check my messages once a day, but if someone wants to reach me now, they have to use signal. It also makes it at least less bad for privacy.

My close circle of friends and family do use signal for me and I only get relevant messages every few days on WhatsApp, but getting rid of it still isn't possible in my situation.

There are no advantages for WhatsApp, it just happened to exist before Signal. The only selling point is the user lock in. WhatsApp could show a 30 second ad for every sent message and let an AI crawl all your chats and it would stay the most used messenger in countries where it currently is.

People don't use WhatsApp because they like it so much, but because not using it means loosing friends and excludes from hobbies.

This inspired me

Never had WhatsApp, never will

The advantage is comfort and numbness. Even if it is considered to be a negative advantage by any tech savvy mind - or any other reasonable and logical person. My point is to not whine around like OP. Either use it and get fucked or don't use it and have a good life.

South Park on point as always:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fGKR1Z1lRik

Yeah for such things it’s quite difficult and I don’t want my kids to have to sacrifice anything or be the odd ones out if I don’t get informations.

If I was still with their mom, I could have left her to check the Whatsapp part and be fully done with it, but since it’s not the case, I don’t want to miss anything, especially as it’s already hard to get all the informations since schools/sports club tend to think it’s okay to only information one separated parent.

Whatsapp has almost an official role in some countries and that’s awful. Still I’m kind of seing a change in this lately..

Not at all.

Thats the neat part, you dont

Unlike all the apps you named it, "users" is what make it still alive to this day

You gonna have to use it with Signal if you want to use Signal that much, or just dont

Thank you, that's a great take

So you would use WhatsApp if they were?

I use it via Beeper On-Device

https://blog.beeper.com/2025/07/16/the-new-beeper/?ref=beeper-faq

I just don't talk to people.

I mean, I didn't watch Game of Thrones, so I'll never be a citizen of humanity. Seems like a decade and a half went by of conversations that went "So did you see Game of Thrones last night?" "No, I don't watch that show." "Oh. Bye." The sooner you realize everyone is an empty headed content consumer and there has never been anything worth saying to or hearing from any of them, the sooner you'll wonder why you even own a phone.

I don't have Whatsapp and I will never use it. If people don't want to use Signal, Telegram, XMPP, Matrix, SimpleX, or Delta Chat, we will talk over RCS/SMS.

The few people who really care about me, agreed to contact me via SMS.
The close family even uses XMPP for me.

People from the United States can't understand how difficult is for us who live in countries where WhatsApp is used for everything, they can't understand this trend began even before Meta bought Whatsapp. In Mexico is a nightmare without WhatsApp because is the main source of communication not only for the people but for your job, delivery, assistance and more. So basically what you can do is to have a device for WhatsApp and another for your private life

Usually it's hard not to. Humans are social beings. You gotta like have strong beliefs or hate everyone but tbh if someone doesn't put the effort to just install an app to stay in contact they probs didn't like you that much.

Sms is now so developped, sending pictures and videos, calling is one click away, no need to install or update : it is surprisingly useful.
Then you have the same issue with Wechat for Chinese communities

While your statement was true regarding phone (and WhatsApp) being a lifestyle choice, it has become a critical requirement for participating in the society.

In India, every little thing now requires WhatsApp. Want to contact your doctor, lawyer or want to get receipt? Good luck if you don't have a smartphone and WhatsApp.

So not having WhatsApp is not a choice. Believe me. I have been running GrapheneOS, WhatsApp free. It is so hard.