A resume that beats an Applicant Tracking System isn't fancier than a normal resume. It's just more disciplined. Here are twelve specific things to check before you click Submit. Most take under a minute to fix.
Formatting
1. Single column. No tables, no text boxes, no icons-as-bullets.
ATS parsers read top to bottom, left to right. Any layout that breaks that flow — two-column resumes, sidebar contact info in a text box, icons in place of bullet points — risks being parsed as a single confused string. If you're using a Canva or Word template that has a sidebar, copy the content into a single-column document.
2. Standard section headings.
Summary, Experience, Education, Skills, Projects, Certifications. Don't rename them. "What I've Built" is creative; "Experience" is parseable. If the ATS doesn't categorize your work history, the recruiter's filter for "5+ years experience" won't match you.
3. Standard fonts, 10–12pt body.
Inter, Helvetica, Arial, Calibri, Georgia. Anything else risks not embedding correctly in the PDF. Body copy at 10 or 11pt; section headings at 12 or 13pt.
4. Real PDF, not an image.
Open the PDF you're about to submit. Try to highlight a paragraph with your cursor. If individual words can be selected, you're fine. If you select an entire rectangle of pixels, the PDF is a flattened image and the ATS will reject it as unparseable. Re-export from Word, Google Docs, or a PDF generator that preserves text.
Dates and contact info
5. Reverse-chronological order.
Newest role first. Always. Functional and "skills-first" resumes confuse parsers and most recruiters.
6. Consistent date format throughout.
Pick one: Jan 2022 – Present or 01/2022 – Present. Mixing them breaks tenure calculations. Don't write "2 yrs" — give a start and end date.
7. Contact info on its own line, not in a header.
Many ATS parsers strip headers/footers. Put your name, email, phone, city, and LinkedIn URL on the first line of the body, separated by · or |. Skip the photo, address, and date of birth — they're filtered in many countries and irrelevant in all of them.
Keywords
8. Mirror the JD's exact phrasing where it's accurate.
If the JD says "TypeScript," your resume should say "TypeScript" — not "TS" and not "JavaScript with strong typing." Same for "stakeholder management" vs "worked with internal partners." This isn't keyword stuffing; it's keyword matching. The ATS scores against the JD's literal text.
9. Include keywords in the body, not just a skills section.
A skills section listing "Python, SQL, Tableau" is fine, but most ATSs weigh keywords in context — i.e., in your bullet points — more heavily. If you used SQL on a project, the bullet should say so.
10. Don't invent skills you don't have.
The ATS doesn't catch lies. The recruiter who reads the top-ranked resumes does. And so does the technical interviewer. If TypeScript isn't in your background, it stays in the "missing keywords" list — that's a signal to learn it before applying for that specific role, not to fake it.
Bullet content
11. Lead with a strong verb. Quantify when you can.
Replace "Worked on" / "Helped with" / "Was responsible for" with specific verbs: built, shipped, designed, drove, reduced, led, automated, scaled. Then add a number. "Built X" is fine. "Built X handling 200K monthly users" is much better. Use ranges if you don't have an exact figure ("20–30%").
12. Tailor for each role.
A resume that wins for a backend SWE role at a startup is a different document than the one that wins for a platform engineering role at a bank. The duty bullets are 70% the same, but which ones you lead with and which keywords appear in the summary should change for each application. This is the step most candidates skip — and the one with the highest impact on whether the resume gets past the filter.
Quick verification
Once you've worked through the list, do these three checks:
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Save your resume as
.pdf, then open it in a different app (Preview, Acrobat, the browser) and try to copy-paste the entire content. If you can paste structured text with your formatting roughly intact, the parser will be able to read it. If pasting produces garbage or nothing, fix the source document. -
Read the JD. Mark every noun and proper noun (technologies, tools, certifications, methodologies). Compare against your resume. The match should be at least 70%, ideally 85%.
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Read your bullets out loud. Anywhere you stumble or fall back on weak verbs, rewrite.
If you'd rather automate steps 2 and 3, paste your resume and the JD into our optimizer. It does the keyword diff, scores the match, and rewrites the weak bullets — about thirty seconds end to end. Free to see your score and the missing keywords; pay $4.99 only if you want the clean PDF.
For role-specific keyword guides, see our pages on software engineer, data analyst, product manager, and marketing manager resumes.