iOS 26: Contact posters cannot be removed and “Phone” storage balloons (~3 GB) — severe regression

Problem summary

On iOS 26, Contact Posters (contact photos/posters) that are set cannot be removed or reverted to the default/basic avatar. The only way to remove a poster is to delete and recreate the entire contact. In addition, the system’s Phone storage usage grows unexpectedly large (I measured ~3 GB) after setting posters for only four or five contacts. These issues together create poor usability and unnecessary storage waste.

Steps to reproduce

1. Device / OS: iPhone 16 Plus / iOS 26.0
2. Set a Contact Poster (system or custom image) for a contact.
3. Attempt to remove the poster or restore the default avatar in the contact/poster editor — there is no “Delete poster / Restore default” control.
4. Check storage: Settings > General > iPhone Storage > Phone — the Phone app’s storage usage is significantly increased (approx. 3 GB in my case).

What I tried (brief)

• Looked for a poster deletion option in the contact and poster editor; none found.
• Restarted device and rebuilt indexes — no meaningful change.
• Deleted and re-added the contact: this removes the poster but is an impractical/workaround solution.

Suggested fixes (concise & actionable)

1. Add an explicit “Delete Poster / Restore Default” control in the Contact Poster editor (or restore the previous swipe-up delete interaction).
2. Allow removing or replacing a poster without deleting the contact.
3. Optimize poster storage: deduplicate, compress, and cache posters on demand; provide a settings path to clear contact media (Settings > Storage > Phone > Clear Contact Media).
4. Fix the underlying persistence/cache logic that causes the Phone app’s storage to grow to GB levels and document temporary cleanup steps in release notes.

Severity

High — the change removes a basic, previously available interaction and causes substantial storage bloat from a small number of posters. This impacts usability and storage-constrained users and should be prioritized.