Restoring ringtones purchased from iTunes

I am happy to see that I am not the only one very annoyed by this. In the "full" backup it asked me to transfer purchases and I said "YES" and yet, my tones are gone.

Typically or at least at one point in IOS if I bought something on my phone, then went to my Ipad and found it again in the Itunes store, clicked "buy" again, it would either turn the button into "Download" or I'd click "Buy" and it would tell me I'd already purchased this "would you like to download it again". NOT THE SAME thing with these stupid tones.

I am angry that I am even waisting my time with this. This should be so straight forward. APPLE Just restore the darn ring tones, if you can invent the iPhone, you can figure this out for us. Come on.

Apple are not here, these are user-to-user forums. Ringtones (and audiobooks) are one-time downloads from the store. If you had copied them over to your computer's iTunes then they should be in the Tones part of its library - if they are then you can sync them to your devices.

Frankly, the situation became a nightmare; few days ago I’ve lost my music albums (120+) and I spend more than 4 hrs with an open discussion with apple support, today I discovered that I’ve lost my ringtones and my apps.

My company’s staff and I (10 mobiles) we have decided to purchase iPhones since the first edition, now we planning to switch to other brands than iPhone, “not any more nightmares”. Sorry guys but not any waste of time to restore something that I have paid for.

Cheers Takis

Where? On the main page when you plug your phone in under the second category "Backups." If you click Computer as the place to backup your information it says right below that, "A full backup of your iPhone will be stored on this computer." Clearly the word "full" is incorrect.

Depends upon what you are expecting 'full' to mean. It's a full backup of your documents, files, photos taken with the device (for cloud backups you have a choice for which apps to backup to the cloud) - none of your iTunes are included in a backup (either on iTunes nor to the cloud), if you backup to your computer's iTunes then the restore picks up your downloads from your iTunes library (if you have them on it)

What do you mean depends on my meaning of full? Who are you? Bill Clinton? I have to define the meaning of is? Full means full. Not partial, not some, and not a little bit of this and a little of that. It means full. There's no ambiguity in the word.

It is a full backup of your documents/files in your apps, unlike an iCloud backup where you can select which apps are backed up, no iTunes downloads are included in a backup. If you have failed to copy your downloads over to your computer's iTunes library, the store's terms advise you to take a copy of them, then you have lost them.

King, you're either biased or your'e trying to be annoying.

I can't get too mad at ya because I used to be that way when I was a preteen. Perhaps like you now, I thought that if Apple stated somewhere in their Terms and Conditions that when we buy ringtone media, as opposed to all the other media on iTunes (despite it being priced and packaged similar to said media in every other way), ringtones are special; that means you get to download it only once, then we forget your ever bought it and will make you buy it again if you don't do this, that, and the other thing, to preserve the file copy yourself.

I'd have thought that Apple fulfilled their duty to disclose (assuming they even did that much)...but in this instance, I'd be flat wrong.

Thank goodness we have a far more mature legal system in this country, one that pays significant attention not just to the letter of the law, but its spirit as well. Our legal system recognizes that it's far more valuable to the evolution of society if we can trust co's like Apple when we're buying what we have every right to believe is a familiar product.

It's a tenet of the law called "public confusion" and, not being a lawyer myself, I understand it to mean that it really doesn't matter what a company might have snuck into the legalese of their T's and C's, if 2 out of 10 reasonable consumers thought it was one way, and it's another, the co's going to be the one with the problem.

And this ain't 2 out of 10 that'll be confused/surprised by this ridiculousness, I'll bet it's well over half...WELL over half!

This is setting up to be another class action, like the "water damage" policy on the iPhone...except this one is far more egregious.

I've purchased no less than 35 ringtones from iTunes in the last decade; I have four saved in iTunes....that, plus I just wasted an hour figuring out that I was screwed. Talk about insult to injury, I'll never get that time back and I'm ******!

Christian Hunter

You are only guaranteed one download of any item from the store, not just ringtones. The terms, which you agreed to, advise you take a copy of all of your downloads :

Some iTunes Eligible Content that you previously purchased may not be available for subsequent download at any given time, and Apple shall have no liability to you in such event. As you may not be able to subsequently download certain previously-purchased iTunes Eligible Content, once you download an item of iTunes Eligible Content, it is your responsibility not to lose, destroy, or damage it, and you may want to back it up.

When I connect a device to my computer's iTunes and take a backup I get a prompt if there are any purchases on the device (including ringtones) that aren't on my computer and if I would like to transfer them over - or without backing up you can copy them manually via File > Devices > Transfer Purchases. If you aren't doing that then you risking losing any item, not just ringtones, if you only have them on that device and if you then have problems with that device - any item (app, music album etc) can be removed from a country's store at any time.

Thank you. A perfect explanation.

Did you by chance backup and sync the ringtone purchases to your iTunes on your computer? I just had to have my phone worked on and did the iCloud backup and when I got the loaner I was able to download everything that was on my phone to the loaner (even my ringtones). A few pictures and songs did not transfer which I was ok with because I transferred them to my computer. When I received the email that my phone was ready for pick up there was not enough room on the iCloud to do another backup so I had to do it on my computer with iTunes. I got my phone back yesterday and went home, hooked it to the computer and did the restore from iTunes... When I got a phone call today I realized that my ring tone was the generic iPhone ringtone.. I plugged my phone back into my computer, opened iTunes and found the ringtone in the Music Library/Purchased and picked it up and dragged it to where it shows your phone. My ringtone is now back on my phone.. I guess if you did not sync to iTunes on your computer it may be lost... Hope this helps and if this was already answered sorry I answered again!

I did the "full" backup, and also clicked yes on the transfer purchases but itunes still didn't transfer any of my ringtones. So make extra certain that your ringtones have been transfered and well, don't buy tones from itunes.

i wish I would have read this first... Lesson learned I will never buy another tone from iTunes again cause I'm not paying for the same thing I bought more then once... I'll go the long route and get them for free... DISAPPOINTED IN THIS PROCESS

You can try, but since 8.1.1 ios update they don't sync back to device. Rest of them are fine.

That's carp that you lose your ringtone and have to buy a new one.... I upgraded from a 3GS to iPhone 5. I brought a ******* ringtone on the new phone, then decided to restore the apps from my old phone to the ******* new one, and that's how I lost my ******* ring tone how ******** no wonder people buy android phones... bad ******* company policy......😠😠😠😠😠