Guide · 8 min read

How to Make a Resume ATS-Friendly

Over 90% of large employers route resumes through Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) before a human ever opens them. This guide explains how ATS works and walks through the exact formatting choices that keep your resume readable to both the software and the recruiter on the other side.

What is an ATS?

An Applicant Tracking System is software employers use to receive, parse, store, and search resumes. When you submit a PDF or DOCX, the ATS extracts the text, splits it into structured fields (name, contact, work history, skills), and scores it against the job description's keywords. Resumes that parse cleanly and contain the right keywords surface to recruiters first.

How ATS reads your resume

• It reads top-to-bottom, left-to-right — multi-column layouts often scramble.
• It looks for standard section headings (Summary, Experience, Education, Skills).
• It pulls dates, titles, and companies from each Experience entry as separate fields.
• Images, icons, text boxes, headers/footers, and tables frequently get dropped.
• Non-standard fonts may be substituted, breaking spacing or rendering as gibberish.

10 rules for an ATS-friendly resume

1. Use a single-column layout. Sidebars cause parsing errors.
2. Stick to standard section headings: Summary, Experience, Education, Skills, Projects, Certifications.
3. Use a common font. Arial, Calibri, or Georgia render reliably everywhere.
4. Keep formatting simple. Avoid text boxes, tables, columns, icons, and graphics.
5. Put contact info in the body — not inside the document header/footer.
6. Spell out abbreviations once (e.g. "Search Engine Optimization (SEO)").
7. Match keywords from the job description naturally in your bullets and skills.
8. Use a consistent date format like "Jan 2023 – Present".
9. Quantify achievements. Numbers, percentages, and scale stand out.
10. Submit as PDF unless DOCX is requested. A text-based PDF is most reliable.

Format checklist

ATS resume examples

Every template in ResumeForge is built to follow these rules — single column, standard fonts, plain bullets, real headings. Browse them to see what a clean, parseable resume actually looks like:

View ATS-friendly resume templates →

Keywords: tailor every application

ATS scoring is keyword-driven. Read the job posting and mirror its phrasing — if it says "stakeholder management," write "stakeholder management," not "managed stakeholders." Include both spelled-out and acronym forms of technical terms. Don't keyword-stuff; recruiters still read the top results.

Build yours in minutes

ResumeForge handles the ATS formatting rules for you, so you can focus on the content. Fill in the guided form, watch the live preview update, and download a clean PDF.