Is watching your recordings really that necessary?

I see a lot of advice here to watch your recordings. If someone is not improving, people blame it on not watching recordings.

But do intermediate to high elo players really watch recordings that much? I feel like spending time playing is more beneficial.

About 5 years ago, I personally reached 1800 elo on Voobly and have beaten a lot of 1900+ and 2000+ elo players just by playing many games a day every day. I didn't have time to watch my recordings, I just played a ton and climbed the ladder. What I did do was spectating better players play and see what things they did. I also looked at their mistakes (2000+ elo players still made a lot of small mistakes believe it or not).