Clean install for Yosemite and restore existing Mavericks apps?

[erichkooi]

Hello.
Is there a way to backup existing Mavericks app and do the clean install Yosemite and restore backup apps from Mavericks?

Note: The reason I don't wish to redownload from App Store is because my data plan is expensive in my country.

 

[satcomer]

Then I would look at a cloning program like Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper. This way you could do a clone, download Yosemite and use a USB thumb drive and How to make a bootable OS X 10.10 Yosemite install drive ( if you use the "Option 1" it will make a good Recovery Mode partition).

This way you have a bootable thumb drive to install Yosemite.

 

[Bending Pixels]

Some app's (mostly those from Apple) can be restored via Time Machine. However, app's such as Adobe's Creative Cloud don't restore properly. I opted to do a clean install and re-download everything. Yeah...it took maybe an hour more to do that, but...it was worth it