diff --git a/backend/src/intake/backgroundRemoval.ts b/backend/src/intake/backgroundRemoval.ts
index 2659d68..d19f8d1 100644
--- a/backend/src/intake/backgroundRemoval.ts
+++ b/backend/src/intake/backgroundRemoval.ts
@@ -189,14 +189,19 @@ export interface RemovalSummary {
 /**
  * What a whole-item restore did.
  *
- * No `failed`, because restoring cannot fail the way removing can: it is a
- * database swap with no sidecar in it, and a photo that was never cut out is
- * skipped rather than being an error.
+ * Carries `failed` for the same reason `RemovalSummary` does. Restoring is a
+ * database swap with no sidecar in it, so it fails far less often than
+ * removing does — but "far less often" is not "never", and a database error
+ * partway through a four-photo restore is exactly the moment an admin needs
+ * the count rather than a bare 500. A photo that was never cut out is skipped
+ * rather than being an error either way.
  */
 export interface RestoreSummary {
   total: number;
   /** How many were put back. Photos that were never cut out are not counted. */
   restored: number;
+  /** Whether it stopped early because one of them failed. */
+  failed: boolean;
 }
 
 /** Every photo of one item, in order. */
@@ -252,6 +257,26 @@ export async function removeBackgroundsForItem(itemId: number): Promise<RemovalS
  * A photo that was never cut out is skipped rather than refused — the mixed
  * state a partial removal leaves behind has to be restorable too, and half an
  * item is exactly when somebody reaches for this.
+ *
+ * Stops at the first genuine failure and reports the count, the same shape
+ * `removeBackgroundsForItem` uses and for the same reason: a caller standing
+ * in front of the screen needs to know how far it got, and rethrowing here
+ * would discard that in favour of a bare 500. `NoOriginalToRestoreError` is
+ * not a genuine failure — it is skipped, as before — so it never reaches this
+ * stop.
+ *
+ * The `failed` path has no integration test, deliberately. The only failure it
+ * can report is a database fault, and the only way to inject one into a real
+ * run is to interfere with the single pool every integration suite in the
+ * `--runInBand` process shares — the same pool `afterAll` calls `pool.end()`
+ * on. Tests that did exactly that left the suite reporting a failure against
+ * its own `afterAll` and leaking a handle that stopped it exiting. Nor is the
+ * fault reachable through data alone: the swap's `WHERE original_image_path IS
+ * NOT NULL` guarantees the value it writes into the `NOT NULL` `image_path`,
+ * and `item_images` carries no unique, check or foreign-key constraint on
+ * either column, so no row can be seeded that makes the statement fail. The
+ * branch is covered instead by `tests/unit/backgroundRemoval.test.ts`, which
+ * stubs the database module in its own module registry and shares nothing.
  */
 export async function restoreOriginalsForItem(itemId: number): Promise<RestoreSummary> {
   const imageIds = await imageIdsFor(itemId);
@@ -262,10 +287,14 @@ export async function restoreOriginalsForItem(itemId: number): Promise<RestoreSu
       await restoreImageOriginal(imageId);
       restored += 1;
     } catch (err) {
-      // Only "there was nothing to restore" is skipped. Anything else is a real
-      // failure and belongs to the caller.
-      if (!(err instanceof NoOriginalToRestoreError)) throw err;
+      // Only "there was nothing to restore" is skipped. Anything else is a
+      // real failure, logged for the same reason removeBackgroundsForItem
+      // logs rather than throws: the caller gets the count, which is the
+      // thing it can act on, and the reason belongs in the log.
+      if (err instanceof NoOriginalToRestoreError) continue;
+      console.error(`[background-removal] restoring item ${itemId}, image ${imageId}:`, err);
+      return { total: imageIds.length, restored, failed: true };
     }
   }
-  return { total: imageIds.length, restored };
+  return { total: imageIds.length, restored, failed: false };
 }
diff --git a/backend/src/intake/draftingWorker.ts b/backend/src/intake/draftingWorker.ts
index cee2b6e..42620cb 100644
--- a/backend/src/intake/draftingWorker.ts
+++ b/backend/src/intake/draftingWorker.ts
@@ -165,8 +165,16 @@ export async function draftQueued(limit = DEFAULT_BATCH): Promise<SweepResult> {
       //
       // This is the sender's tick from the submission page, honoured here so
       // they never waited for it — and a failure must not mark a draft that was
-      // written correctly as failed. The photo keeps its original in that case,
-      // and the admin's per-photo control is still there to do it by hand.
+      // written correctly as failed.
+      //
+      // removeBackgroundsForItem no longer rejects over a single photo failing
+      // (#293 gave it a summary instead, for the admin screen that acts on the
+      // count) — so this .catch now fires only if the image-listing query
+      // itself throws, which is rare enough to warrant a log and nothing more.
+      // A per-photo failure comes back as `failed: true` in the summary, which
+      // this sweep discards; the photo keeps its original in that case, and the
+      // admin's per-photo control in the review queue is still there to do it
+      // by hand.
       //
       // Awaited, unlike the notification below, so a sweep that has returned
       // has finished its work. Nothing is waiting on this: the worker is off
diff --git a/backend/src/routes/admin.ts b/backend/src/routes/admin.ts
index 6e6c1cd..f6021e0 100755
--- a/backend/src/routes/admin.ts
+++ b/backend/src/routes/admin.ts
@@ -352,7 +352,7 @@ router.post('/items/:id/mark-available', asyncRoute(async (req: Request, res: Re
 }));
 
 /**
- * One item's images, or null when the item does not exist.
+ * Whether an item with this id exists.
  *
  * Checked before acting so an absent item is a 404 rather than a cheerful
  * summary of nothing. `removeBackgroundsForItem` would happily report
@@ -396,6 +396,11 @@ router.post('/items/:id/remove-backgrounds', asyncRoute(async (req: Request, res
  * The reason removing is safe to try. Photos that were never cut out are
  * skipped rather than refused, so a half-done item — what a partial failure
  * leaves behind — is restorable too.
+ *
+ * Answers 200 once the id is valid, same as remove-backgrounds and for the
+ * same reason: `restoreOriginalsForItem` stops at the first genuine failure
+ * rather than throwing, so there is always a summary to return, never a bare
+ * 500 that discards how far it got.
  */
 router.post('/items/:id/restore-originals', asyncRoute(async (req: Request, res: Response) => {
   const itemId = readId(req.params.id);
diff --git a/backend/tests/integration/adminItemBackgrounds.integration.test.ts b/backend/tests/integration/adminItemBackgrounds.integration.test.ts
index 5093f4b..72e3c0f 100644
--- a/backend/tests/integration/adminItemBackgrounds.integration.test.ts
+++ b/backend/tests/integration/adminItemBackgrounds.integration.test.ts
@@ -142,7 +142,7 @@ describe('restoring every original on an item', () => {
     const res = await request(app).post(`/api/admin/items/${itemId}/restore-originals`);
 
     expect(res.status).toBe(200);
-    expect(res.body).toEqual({ total: 2, restored: 2 });
+    expect(res.body).toEqual({ total: 2, restored: 2, failed: false });
   });
 
   it('answers 404 for an id that cannot be read', async () => {
@@ -150,6 +150,15 @@ describe('restoring every original on an item', () => {
 
     expect((await request(app).post('/api/admin/items/abc/restore-originals')).status).toBe(404);
   });
+
+  // remove-backgrounds has always had this case; restore-originals did not,
+  // and the two handlers are copy-paste rather than a shared helper — nothing
+  // would have caught them diverging.
+  it('answers 404 for an item that does not exist', async () => {
+    await startStub(answerWithPng);
+
+    expect((await request(app).post('/api/admin/items/999999/restore-originals')).status).toBe(404);
+  });
 });
 
 // Extra scope beyond the endpoints themselves: Task 3 derives its button label
diff --git a/backend/tests/integration/backgroundRemoval.integration.test.ts b/backend/tests/integration/backgroundRemoval.integration.test.ts
index 4d3ffd1..297ea03 100644
--- a/backend/tests/integration/backgroundRemoval.integration.test.ts
+++ b/backend/tests/integration/backgroundRemoval.integration.test.ts
@@ -381,7 +381,7 @@ describe('putting every original back', () => {
 
     const summary = await restoreOriginalsForItem(itemId);
 
-    expect(summary).toEqual({ total: 2, restored: 2 });
+    expect(summary).toEqual({ total: 2, restored: 2, failed: false });
 
     const { rows: after } = await pool.query<{ image_path: string }>(
       `SELECT image_path FROM item_images WHERE item_id = $1 ORDER BY sort_order`,
@@ -412,6 +412,6 @@ describe('putting every original back', () => {
     );
     await removeImageBackground(images[0]!.id);
 
-    expect(await restoreOriginalsForItem(itemId)).toEqual({ total: 2, restored: 1 });
+    expect(await restoreOriginalsForItem(itemId)).toEqual({ total: 2, restored: 1, failed: false });
   });
 });
diff --git a/backend/tests/unit/backgroundRemoval.test.ts b/backend/tests/unit/backgroundRemoval.test.ts
index 23bf41b..a9a9ea5 100644
--- a/backend/tests/unit/backgroundRemoval.test.ts
+++ b/backend/tests/unit/backgroundRemoval.test.ts
@@ -1,4 +1,41 @@
-import { cutoutPathFor } from '../../src/intake/backgroundRemoval';
+import { pool } from '../../src/db';
+import { cutoutPathFor, restoreOriginalsForItem } from '../../src/intake/backgroundRemoval';
+
+// The database module is replaced outright rather than spied on. This has to
+// be a unit test: the only failure `restoreOriginalsForItem` can report is a
+// database fault, and the only way to inject one is to make a query fail on
+// command. Doing that in the integration suite means interfering with the
+// single pool every suite in the same `--runInBand` process shares, and that
+// `afterAll` calls `pool.end()` on — which made the whole suite unrunnable.
+// Here no `Pool` is ever constructed: jest gives this file its own module
+// registry, so there is nothing shared to break.
+jest.mock('../../src/db', () => ({ pool: { query: jest.fn(), connect: jest.fn() } }));
+
+const mockPool = pool as unknown as { query: jest.Mock; connect: jest.Mock };
+
+/** The distinctive text of the swap that puts one photo back. */
+const SWAP_SQL = 'SET image_path = original_image_path';
+
+/**
+ * A pool over `imageIds` whose nth restore swap fails.
+ *
+ * Matching on the swap's SQL rather than counting queries: `restoreImageOriginal`
+ * also issues BEGIN, the `item_drafts` update and COMMIT on the same client, so
+ * a bare call counter would break whichever query happened to land nth.
+ */
+function poolWhoseSwapFailsOn(imageIds: number[], failOnSwap: number): void {
+  mockPool.query.mockResolvedValue({ rows: imageIds.map((id) => ({ id })) });
+  let swaps = 0;
+  mockPool.connect.mockImplementation(async () => ({
+    query: jest.fn(async (sql: string) => {
+      if (!String(sql).includes(SWAP_SQL)) return { rows: [] };
+      swaps += 1;
+      if (swaps === failOnSwap) throw new Error('database is down');
+      return { rows: [{ item_id: 1 }] };
+    }),
+    release: jest.fn()
+  }));
+}
 
 describe('where a cut-out is written', () => {
   // A new file rather than a rewrite of the original, which is what makes the
@@ -20,3 +57,42 @@ describe('where a cut-out is written', () => {
     expect(cutoutPathFor('/uploads/x.png')).toBe('/uploads/x-cutout.png');
   });
 });
+
+describe('when a restore fails partway through an item', () => {
+  // Logged rather than thrown, so the log line is expected here; silenced to
+  // keep it out of the suite's output rather than because it does not matter.
+  let logged: jest.SpyInstance;
+
+  beforeEach(() => {
+    jest.clearAllMocks();
+    logged = jest.spyOn(console, 'error').mockImplementation(() => {});
+  });
+
+  afterEach(() => {
+    logged.mockRestore();
+  });
+
+  // The case the summary's `failed` field exists for: a genuine database
+  // failure partway through must not turn into a bare 500 that discards how
+  // far the restore got. It has to stop, report the count, and let the caller
+  // decide whether to retry — the same contract removeBackgroundsForItem has.
+  it('stops at the first genuine failure and reports how far it got', async () => {
+    poolWhoseSwapFailsOn([11, 22, 33], 2);
+
+    await expect(restoreOriginalsForItem(4)).resolves.toEqual({
+      total: 3,
+      restored: 1,
+      failed: true
+    });
+  });
+
+  // The third photo is never attempted, which is what makes pressing Restore
+  // again worth something: it resumes rather than starting over.
+  it('does not go on to the photos after the one that failed', async () => {
+    poolWhoseSwapFailsOn([11, 22, 33], 2);
+
+    await restoreOriginalsForItem(4);
+
+    expect(mockPool.connect).toHaveBeenCalledTimes(2);
+  });
+});