Iphone backup doubled size on icloud after update to IOS 17.2.1

Before the update, my back up used to be less the 1GB to my iPhone and about 1gb to my iPad. I never back up things like emails, Photos, messages... and suddenly I started to get alerts saying back up could not be completed.

I deleted the old backups for both devices, revised the list of apps that were being backed up and even turned off a few apps that I do not consider important, nevertheless, each device is creating backups with 2.5gb or more.

The only difference from a month ago is the new IOS. Any suggestions on how to fix that?

It makes me think that Apple is forcing users to upgrade to iCloud+ with the monthly subscription.