The short answer is – Yes, for most people.
In the past, you only needed to pay a yearly licence fee for watching LIVE TV, but since September 2016, you also need to pay the fee if you watch ANYTHING on BBC iPlayer, and, as before, if you watch ANY live TV channels.
So the only way to skip the licence fee entirely, is if you don’t watch (or record) ANY live channels, AND you skip BBC shows entirely, on any device.