Comments on: Help find missing iphone icons.

Question: Help find missing iphone icons.

mbx — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 07:38:54 -0800

Recently been experiencing lost app icons on iphone4. The phone is not jail-broken and has not been updated to ios6. The apps are still there & can be found in the search function. I did a hard reboot and some icons returned (not all), but worse, the reboot blew up my folders and screen setup. I also tried turning on & off the restrictions. No luck. Not sure what happened but is there any way to restore the icons without major disruption? Thanks.

By: samsara

samsara — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 07:43:10 -0800

I noticed this happening on my phone as well post iOS 6. Of course part of the issue is that I have more icons than pages, so had to trim things down. The only solution I've found so far is to do a home screen reset (settings -> general -> reset -> reset home screen layout). This will still break down folders unfortunately...so those will have to be recreated.

By: Burhanistan

Burhanistan — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 08:51:27 -0800

How does the screen layout look in iTunes when you have the phone connected?

By: mbx

mbx — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 10:27:57 -0800

Burhanistan: The layout in iTunes replicates the 3 pages of icons that I have set up on my iPhone now, then it shows a blank 4th page (not found on my iphone), then it shows 3 subsequent pages (pages 5, 6 & 7) that contain my missing icons; these pages also do not show up on my iphone. Any ideas? Thank you.

By: whittaker

whittaker — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 10:38:55 -0800

To be honest, I think you should go straight to:

Take a backup via iTunes (check off 'Encrypted' and it will save your device passwords too.)

Restore your phone using iTunes (essentially reinstall the OS).

When iTunes prompts you, load all your data from backup onto your phone.

Even if it doesn't solve the problem, ensuring that you went through Step One will be helpful if it turns out your phone is corrupted/dying.

By: mbx

mbx — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 16:54:22 -0800

Thanks. After the long haul of backing up, updating ios, syncing and refoldering everything appears to be back in order.