How can I backup jailbreak (Cydia) iPhone apps?

So you've jailbroken your iPhone and have all these great apps and tweaks running. What if something happens and you need to restore? How can you back up your jailbroken apps?

Cydia and iTunes will not back up your jailbreak apps. Try these two solutions to make the process of reloading all of those packages from different sources a little bit easier.

1. PKGBackup is $7.99 in the BigBoss repository. You can choose which apps you're interested in backing up, and when you restore you can pick which apps to reinstall. PKGBackup actually just stores a list of the packages and sources you've installed from in Cydia to automate the process of reinstalling apps.

2. AptBackup is free in the BigBoss repository. Like PKGBackup, this utility also stores a list of your jailbroken apps. The list is stored with settings files and backed up with iTunes. AptBackup has a much simpler interface, with only two buttons: Backup and Restore. Restore should find and restore your apps automatically, although restore failures have been reported by some users.