How to make your resume ATS-friendly

Many employers put applications through an applicant tracking system (ATS) before a person reads them. The software turns your file into plain text and sorts it into fields. Your job is to make that text come out complete and in the right order.

What an ATS actually does

An ATS stores applications, extracts the text from your resume, and tries to recognise your name, contact details, job titles, dates, education and skills. Recruiters then search and filter those fields, often by keywords from the job posting. If the text comes out jumbled or missing, you can be filtered out even when you are qualified.

Layout

Use a single column. Two-column layouts can be read across the columns, mixing your skills into your work history.
Keep important information out of headers, footers, text boxes and tables, which some systems skip.
Do not put text inside images or icons. A picture of your phone number cannot be read as text.
Use standard section headings: Education, Experience, Skills, Projects, Certifications.

Formatting

Use a clear, common font at 10 to 12 points for body text, and margins of at least half an inch.
Use simple round bullets. Decorative symbols from fonts such as Wingdings can come out as stray characters.
Write dates the same way everywhere, such as "Aug 2023 – Oct 2023", so the system can work out your timeline.
Send a PDF created from a resume builder or word processor, not a scan or photo.

Wording and keywords

Read the job posting and use the same words for the skills and tools you genuinely have. If the posting says "React", write "React", not only "front-end frameworks". Spell out abbreviations once, for example "Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)". Do not paste in keywords you cannot back up: a person reads your resume next.

Check what the software sees

The SlashResumex ATS checker reads your PDF the way an ATS does, in your browser, and shows the extracted text along with anything missing or out of order. Paste the job posting to see which of its keywords your resume covers.

No tool can tell you exactly how one employer's system is configured. Aim for a resume that any system can read cleanly and any person can skim quickly; that combination is what helps.

A quick checklist

One column, standard headings, no tables or text boxes for key details.
Contact details as plain text at the top.
Consistent dates and job titles.
Skills that match the posting, where they are true.
A text-based PDF, checked with an ATS checker before you apply.