Following ui 7 , App labels (words) are present but the related icons/logos are intermittently missing from folders

[Silverfox2025]

Following downloading ui7,  I find that App labels (words) are present but the related icons/logos are intermittently missing from folders.  In more detail, the issue is as follows:

So for example, I looked for  MusicandFilm - a folder I'd created on my App Drawer, that was the page immediately behind the Home Screen.  Within that folder, I'd put 4 Apps, namely Spotify, Audials, VLC and Prime Video,  to keep broadly similar types of App together. 

Prior to ui7, on the App Drawer page, I had something that looked like a thumbnail shape containing pictures of the 4 Music and Film type Apps in one folder with small icon logos for each App.  I'd tap on the folder then the 4 Apps would enlarge to get bigger on the screen and then I'd tap on whichever App I wanted to open.

As I got familiar with this approach, I could effectively put 50 plus Apps on a single page by having folders named Samsung, Google, Banking, Communications, Ignore  and so on.

It may be a coincidence, but since ui7, names of the folders in words, like "Music and Film", still always show but the small icons/logo of one or more of the folders disappears.  So, for example Spotify's green circle on a black background might go missing.  If I clicked the resultant blank space - where the icon / logo should be - the relevant App still opens.  Two hours later, the Spotify icon logos might be visible but the VLC orange and white cone picture has disappeared.  For two days this problem might not recur, then repeats itself but in respect of a different folder.  

Samsung's Chat help folks had no suggestion how to fix this issue but suggested an update to ui7, planned for October 2025 might resolve it.  

I could wait until October or perhaps ditch and switch to Nova Launcher.  

[Oxford]

S24 Ultra here on One UI7 with the June 1 update. Mine hasn't changed and is exactly the way it was prior to One UI7. My initial thought is there is either an app or a process that's conflicting with folder visualization. Have you cleared your phone systems cache since you did the upgrade to One UI7? Also, have you run the good Guardians Galaxy App Booster? If so I'm at a loss, and I hope someone else has some suggestions. Just thought of something else, are you using the icon package from Theme Park?

[Mujibar]

Try clearing cache and data for One UI Home under settings, apps. You may have to reapply some of your settings afterward.

If you didn't clear device cache after the update, make sure you do that also.

1) Turn off your device.

[Your device may need to be connected to a powered USB device (ex: computer) before proceeding to the next step.]

2) Press and hold the Volume Up button and the Side/Power button until you feel a vibration and the Samsung logo appears. Let go of the buttons.

3) You will now be in Android recovery. Use the Volume buttons to highlight "Wipe cache partition."

4) Press the Side/Power button to execute.

5) Use the Volume buttons to highlight "Yes."

6) Press the Side/Power button to execute.

7) "Reboot system now" will already be highlighted. Press the Side/Power button to execute.

[Silverfox2025]

Thank you both for your helpful tips. I cleared the phone's systems cache and that didn't help.  I don't have Theme Park but I will try the Guardians Galaxy App Booster. 

[Silverfox2025]

I've gone back into Folder Grid, that is Press Home Screen -> Settings ->  Folder Grid -> change from 4x4 option to 3x4 option.  I await to see if this helps. 

[SolveForce · Accepted solution]

You're dealing with a very specific behavior after upgrading to One UI 7 on the Galaxy S24: app names (labels) are visible inside folders, but the icons (logos) for some apps go missing intermittently. Tapping the blank space where the icon used to be still opens the app. It rotates between folders and doesn’t affect the same app each time. System cache clearing has already been tried, including wiping the cache partition from recovery mode. Theme Park is not in use. App Booster is being tested. The Folder Grid layout has been changed from 4x4 to 3x4 as a test.

All that said, here’s what we know: if the icon label appears but the image does not, the app is still registered in the system. This means it’s not an issue of the app being uninstalled, corrupted, or hidden. So what else could be causing it?

Let’s start from the bottom and work our way up.

1. Display rendering and memory



This may sound basic, but missing folder icons is a sign of rendering engine failure, not necessarily app failure. That means One UI Home (the launcher) is not drawing the folder preview tiles completely. This could be tied to RAM prioritization, GPU rendering delays, or animation engine bugs. The phone doesn’t think the icon is missing. It simply doesn’t bother to draw it in time.

On a UI level, folders don’t display the actual app icons live — they generate a cached preview (a folder thumbnail). If one or more of the preview icons fails to load or times out, you get a partial or empty visual — even though tapping still works. So the system believes the app is there, but the launcher doesn’t have the visuals ready when it renders the screen.

So the problem might not be in the app icons themselves — it may be in the mechanism that generates folder thumbnails. That mechanism pulls from app icons stored in cache or memory. If memory is being cleared too aggressively, or the launcher cache is unstable after the UI 7 update, this behavior becomes visible.

2. Home screen data or layout compatibility



When an update like One UI 7 is installed, it modifies how the home screen stores layout data. If your layout is carried over from a previous version — especially if it's restored from Smart Switch or Samsung Cloud — there’s a chance the icons were never re-indexed properly for the new visual engine. This would explain why the labels still appear but the visual representation is unstable or fails to refresh.

You may be seeing a mismatch between what's stored in the layout config file and what the icon loader is trying to render. And if that layout config was built on One UI 6.1 and not fully rebuilt after the update, you get instability.

This gets worse if the number of apps per folder is high or if folders are nested in a dense configuration, which causes the launcher to make complex render calls for every folder preview.

3. Good Guardians and App Booster



App Booster doesn’t just “speed up” apps — it actually rebuilds the app launch database and refreshes internal references. If the app icons are being skipped or dropped during the drawing cycle, a refreshed app launch table could help resolve it by recreating dependencies.

That said, App Booster isn’t guaranteed to fix icon thumbnails. It can only help if the lag in icon rendering is tied to app launch optimization, not just folder visuals.

4. Developer options and background process settings



If One UI 7 adjusted your Developer Options or system settings, you may be seeing aggressive app freezing, which can cause icon preview data to unload from memory before it’s drawn. Go to Developer Options and check that "Don't keep activities" is disabled. Also, ensure that background process limit is set to "Standard" and not a lower value like 1 or 2 processes. If it’s too low, the launcher will unload resources from RAM too quickly, especially graphics-heavy ones like icons.

5. Theme engine or invisible overlays

[SolveForce]

Even if Theme Park isn’t installed, Samsung’s system theme manager may have applied or inherited parts of an old theme or font. It may not appear obvious, but remnants of themes or icon packs can interfere with rendering. Switching to the default Samsung theme and font — even just temporarily — can reset the icon resource loader. This includes icon shapes, font rendering, and color layering. The launcher needs to build icon layouts based on consistent UI rules. Any mismatch, even slight, can cause the icons to flicker out or disappear.

6. Folder rendering and layout



The folder grid size matters more than most realize. By default, Samsung generates folder thumbnails based on the number of apps and their assigned preview locations. A 4x4 layout might overload the visual buffer on high-density folders, especially if several folders appear in quick succession. Dropping down to 3x4 or even 3x3 could reduce load stress and improve rendering accuracy.

You’ve already tested this, and that’s a smart move. Wait to see if it stabilizes the icon previews across a longer time window — ideally a day or two. You may need to restart the phone after changing the folder grid to force the new layout cache to regenerate.

7. Reset One UI Home data



This is the most direct — but most disruptive — step. If none of the above works, go to Settings > Apps > One UI Home > Storage > Clear Data. This will wipe your home screen layout and rebuild it from scratch under the new One UI 7 framework. It’s a clean start, and while inconvenient, it can solve almost any layout-related rendering problem because the phone is forced to treat everything as new and reconstruct each icon from the app manifest itself.

If you go this route, take screenshots or use Smart Switch to back up your layout. Or spend time recreating only the affected folders and see if the issue returns.

Final thought:

This issue isn’t really about the apps or folders — it’s about how One UI 7 handles the relationship between folder preview generation, memory management, and cached layouts. You’re seeing a symptom of a deeper architectural shift in how Samsung is organizing launcher visuals. The fix may involve a combination of theme reset, layout simplification, memory management, and app resource re-indexing.

The fact that it cycles from folder to folder is key — it means the system is reaching a limit, not failing in one place. If you reduce visual complexity just enough, it might stabilize again.

Keep track of which folders drop icons and how frequently. This could help triangulate whether it’s based on icon type, app type, folder position, or visual density. You’re already thinking about this the right way — now you’re just tightening the feedback loop.

Let me know what else changes after running App Booster and switching folder layout. This kind of issue almost always has a resolution when it's understood deeply — and you're well on your way there.

[Silverfox2025]

Solveforce,  Thank you for the detailed, amazing information and tips.  It will take me a while to try all the things but I certainly will.  You should work for Samsung - but they wouldn't be able to afford you 🙂

[Silverfox2025]

SolveForce,  Your solution was perfect. Thank you very much.  It also fixed another symptom of the issue that I hadn't mentioned - that was occasionally an icon picture didn't always open the App it was intended to.  For example, in my Banking Folder, clicking the picture for Bank A, actually opened the App for Bank B. That is fixed as well.  I am grateful.