ATS Friendly CV: 2026 Guide with Examples

Use a one-column layout for the application version of your CV. It is easier to read, easier to scan, and less likely to create odd reading order problems when uploaded. You can still make the CV look professional with spacing, bold role titles, and concise bullet points. You do not need heavy design to look credible.

Keep the top of the page simple. Put your name first, then phone number, email address, town or city, and one relevant link if useful. A LinkedIn profile, portfolio, GitHub account, or personal website can help when it supports the target role. Do not make icons the only way to understand contact details. If you use an icon, keep the actual text beside it.

Use standard headings. Creative headings can look personal, but they slow the reader down. A recruiter should not have to work out that "What I bring" means Skills or that "My journey" means Work Experience. Standard labels are not boring; they are useful signposts.

Avoid putting key content into text boxes, images, decorative sidebars, and complex tables. Some designs remain readable, but many create unnecessary risk. If the design changes the order of the text when copied, simplify it. Your application CV should be dependable before it is decorative.

Choose a readable font and keep sizes consistent. Most body text should be comfortable to read. Use bold for job titles, employers, and section headings, but do not bold entire paragraphs. Bullet points should be short enough to scan. A CV that relies on dense blocks of text is hard for recruiters and recruitment platforms to interpret quickly.

Dates matter. Use one date style, such as "Jan 2024 - Present" or "2022 - 2025", and keep it consistent. Place dates close to the role, employer, qualification, or project they describe. Do not hide dates because you are worried about a gap. If you have an employment gap, handle it clearly rather than making the structure vague.

Keep contact details as text, not only icons. A phone symbol without the word or number in plain text is risky. A location pin is not a substitute for your town or city. Do not include age, date of birth, marital status, nationality, or a photo unless there is a specific reason for that role or market. In the UK, those details are usually unnecessary and can distract from job evidence.

CV keywords are useful when they describe real evidence. They are weak when they appear as a disconnected list. A strong ATS CV uses terms from the job advert in the places where they can be supported: the profile, skills section, recent experience, education, projects, and certifications.

Start by reading the advert carefully. Mark the essential requirements, repeated responsibilities, named tools, qualifications, sector language, and outcomes. Then decide which terms are true for you. Do not add a skill because it appears in the advert if you cannot explain your experience with it.

For a project coordinator role, relevant terms might include project documentation, stakeholder updates, risk logs, meeting notes, Excel tracking, and deadlines. Instead of writing those terms randomly, connect them to evidence:

• Profile: Project support assistant with experience preparing meeting notes, updating action logs, and maintaining Excel trackers for operations managers.
• Skills: Stakeholder communication, project documentation, Excel reporting, diary coordination, action logs, meeting support.
• Experience: Updated weekly action logs and highlighted overdue items before manager review meetings.

This style gives the document the right language and gives the recruiter a reason to believe it.

Use the same principle for any role. A customer service CV might include complaint handling, CRM notes, live chat, call handling, refunds, escalation, retention, and customer satisfaction. A data CV might include Excel, SQL, dashboards, data cleaning, reporting, stakeholder requests, and commercial insight. A care CV might include safeguarding, care plans, dignity, communication, medication records, and person-centred care.

The best keywords are specific, honest, and visible. The worst keywords are repeated without proof.

Write contact details as plain text. Include your name, phone number, email address, town or city, and a relevant link. Use a professional email address. Do not include a full address unless there is a practical reason. In most UK applications, age, date of birth, marital status, nationality, and a photo are unnecessary.

Your profile should be short and targeted. Four to six lines is usually enough. Name your target role or job family, summarise your strongest evidence, and include a few relevant terms from the advert.

Weak profile:

Hard-working professional looking for an exciting new opportunity.

Stronger profile:

Customer support adviser with three years' experience handling email, live chat, and phone queries for subscription customers. Confident using Zendesk, updating CRM notes, resolving billing issues, and escalating complex cases with clear written summaries.

The stronger version is specific. It names the role area, tools, tasks, customer context, and working style.

A skills section is useful when the advert includes named requirements. Keep it short and organised. A list of 30 skills feels unfocused. A list of 10 well-chosen skills is easier to trust.

You can group skills if it helps:

• Customer support: complaint handling, live chat, CRM notes, escalation, retention calls.
• Tools: Zendesk, Salesforce, Excel, Teams.
• Working strengths: prioritisation, written communication, accuracy, calm problem-solving.

Make sure the most important skills also appear in your experience. If the skills section says Excel reporting, a bullet should show how you used Excel.

Use reverse chronological order for most CVs. For each role, include job title, employer, dates, and short bullet points. Begin bullets with actions and add context.

Weak bullet:

• Responsible for admin and reports.

Stronger bullet:

• Prepared weekly Excel reports for three account managers, checking customer records and flagging missing renewal information before client calls.

The stronger bullet includes a tool, task, audience, and reason. It also gives a recruiter something concrete to ask about.

Useful bullet patterns include:

• Action + task + tool + result.
• Action + customer/user group + problem solved.
• Action + process improved + business reason.
• Action + team supported + measurable or practical outcome.

Do not invent numbers. If you have a real measure, use it. If not, be specific about the task, scale, frequency, audience, or output.

Use accurate qualification names. Include institution, dates, subjects, grades, and relevant modules where useful. If a job asks for a specific qualification, do not bury it at the bottom. Put it where it can be found quickly.

For early-career candidates, education may come before work experience. For experienced candidates, education usually sits after experience unless a qualification is central to the role.

Projects can strengthen an ATS Friendly CV when paid experience is limited or when a project proves a tool. A project entry should include the project name, context, tools, your contribution, and result.

Example:

Built a Power BI dashboard using sample sales data to track monthly revenue, product categories, and regional performance. Cleaned the source data in Excel, created measures, and wrote a short summary of trends for non-technical readers.

This proves Power BI and Excel better than a simple skills list.

If you have limited work experience, use education, volunteering, clubs, coursework, part-time work, caring responsibilities, and projects. The point is not to pretend you have a long work history. The point is to show useful evidence.

Example profile:

Sixth form leaver applying for customer service and retail roles, with experience supporting school events, handling cash during fundraising activities, and helping visitors with directions and queries. Confident speaking to new people, using Microsoft Office, and staying organised during busy periods.

This profile shows customer-facing evidence without exaggeration. The first job CV guide can help if you need more early-career examples.

Technical CVs often become dense tool lists. Keep the tool names visible, but connect them to projects.

Example bullet:

• Built a React and Node.js booking prototype with form validation, MongoDB storage, and a simple admin view, then documented setup steps in GitHub for review.

That bullet includes tools, output, and documentation. It is much stronger than writing "React, Node.js, MongoDB" with no context.

A career-change CV should translate previous experience into the new target. Do not hide your previous work. Explain why it is relevant.

Example profile:

Former hospitality supervisor moving into HR administration after completing CIPD Foundation study. Experienced in rota planning, onboarding new starters, handling confidential staff issues, and maintaining accurate shift and absence records.

The previous career becomes useful evidence because it is connected to HR tasks.

Senior CVs need structure because there is a lot to include. Use short role summaries, then bullet points that show scope, leadership, and outcomes.

Example bullet:

• Led a 14-person operations team across two sites, improving weekly capacity planning and reducing missed handovers through a standardised reporting process.

This is easier to read than a long paragraph of duties.

Creative applicants can keep a clean application CV and use a portfolio for heavier design. Include tools, clients, campaign types, media formats, and outcomes. Let the CV explain the work clearly, then let the portfolio show the visual quality.

Follow the employer's instructions first. If the application asks for a Word document, send Word. If it asks for PDF, send PDF. If it gives a choice, use the version that keeps your layout and text extraction cleanest.

A PDF is not automatically wrong. A text-based PDF with a simple layout can work well. A Word document can also cause problems if it relies on complex tables or text boxes. The safer question is not "PDF or Word?" It is "Does this file keep the right text in the right order?"

Before sending, test the final export:

1. Copy all text from the file and paste it into a plain text editor.
2. Check that your name, contact details, headings, roles, dates, skills, education, and projects appear in the correct order.
3. Open the file on another device if possible.
4. Upload it to the application form and check any fields that are filled automatically.
5. Keep a clean master version so you can tailor content without redesigning every application.

Use a simple filename, such as firstname-lastname-cv.pdf. Avoid long version notes, special characters, or confusing file names.

An ATS-friendly format gives you a reliable base. Tailoring makes it relevant. You do not need to rewrite every line for every application. Focus on the sections that affect fit most.

Use this process:

1. Read the advert once for the overall role.
2. Read it again and mark required skills, tools, qualifications, responsibilities, and behaviours.
3. Choose the requirements you can genuinely support.
4. Update your profile to reflect the target role.
5. Move the most relevant skills higher.
6. Rewrite recent bullets so they show matching evidence.
7. Remove details that do not help this application.
8. Run the final file check again.

For example, if a marketing coordinator advert emphasises email campaigns, CRM segmentation, reporting, and stakeholder communication, your CV should not lead with unrelated event support. Move campaign work, CRM use, and reporting examples higher. Keep event support only if it proves planning or communication.

Tailoring protects you from keyword stuffing. You are not adding random words. You are deciding which real evidence deserves more space.

Clear structure helps more than ATS readability. It also improves accessibility. Built-in headings, readable fonts, logical order, and descriptive links make the document easier for more people to use. Microsoft Word's accessibility guidance is a helpful reminder that good structure matters before style.

Be careful with personal information. In most UK CVs, you do not need a photo, age, date of birth, marital status, nationality, or full address. National Careers Service guidance also points readers away from unnecessary personal details. Keep the CV focused on role evidence.

Employers using AI-enabled recruitment tools still need to think about fairness, transparency, and data protection. GOV.UK and ICO guidance is useful background here. As a candidate, your best response is not to guess how every tool works. Write accurately, clearly, and in a way that allows your evidence to be understood.

Use official and authoritative sources when checking surrounding guidance.

The National Careers Service CV guidance is useful for UK CV basics such as sections, tailoring, bullet points, and personal details. Microsoft Word accessibility guidance is useful when checking headings, tables, document structure, and readability. GOV.UK responsible AI in recruitment guidance gives context for AI-enabled hiring practices. ICO AI and data protection guidance is useful background for fairness, transparency, and personal data. GOV.UK Equality Act guidance gives broader context on fair treatment in recruitment.

These sources will not tell you exactly how every employer's recruitment platform works. They help you make safer decisions: clear structure, relevant information, careful personal data, and readable evidence.