Emergency, Safe-Mode destroyed my phone. How to get it back?

[usernNxxfNDArJ]

I entered Safe Mode to check if a problem exists in safe mode vs normal mode.

The disaster problem is back in normal mode, I do not have any of my apps. Everything seems to be gone.

Further searching, all my apps are there, but they all went to new windows on the app screen. So I completely lost any and all arrangement of my apps.

So now I cannot find even a single app on my phone. I can search if I know the app, but I know where it is, not I know nothing and my phone is completely unusable.

Is there any way to restore my phone to the pre-safe mode state and how to prevent this from happening again?

[usernNxxfNDArJ]

What's interesting is that not everything went away.

Some apps remained on the home screen and in the app drawer, but most disappeared and were randomly placed at the back.

Furthermore most if not all folders were either deleted or restored to stock configuration.

This is practically like a factory reset. Apps do seem to have data, if I can find them that is.

[usernNxxfNDArJ]

It seems that I am not the first to have this: https://forums.tomsguide.com/threads/problems-after-exiting-safe-mode-on-my-android-samsung-s8-pleas... 

I have never had this happen so maybe if was fixed, and now came back, but it is insane. My phone is almost a brick now. I will see what I can restore when I get home.

[usernNxxfNDArJ]

Something completely different. After exiting safe mode Airplane mode is always on. Now I know why no calls or data was working. Just insane.

[usernNxxfNDArJ]

I am trying the Samsung cloud restore which has a Home Screen option, which requires apps to be selected, but either way it also does not work as home screen gets stuck at 75% indefinitely.

[usernNxxfNDArJ]

Over an hour of waiting, Home screen restore is still stuck at 75%.

[usernNxxfNDArJ]

With more waiting the process simply crashed without restoring everything. I tried one more time and finally it said that you lost internet connectivity and the restore failed. However it actually did restore the majority of my home and app screen layout. Not perfect, but at least usable.

Obviously this does not explain what happened with safe mode and is it safe to ever use again?

[usernNxxfNDArJ · Accepted solution]

I finished restoring the icons to what they should be and then did a cloud backup.

Then at home contacted Samsung support reported an issue and tried to demonstrate the issue during a video call.

Unfortunately or fortunately this time exiting safe mode resulted in proper normal screen, not the messed up version I got the first time. The only thing that did happen is airplane mode was turned on after restart. Something that did happen every time. So after safe mode you need to check that airplane mode is not active.

I wonder if it is connected to Deep Sleeping apps which show up as manually disabled. All I can say about ever going into safe mode is:

DO A HOME SCREEN AND APPS BACKUP, BEFORE SAFE MODE.