CV builder Your facts, a clean CV, nothing invented.

Source: National Careers Service (UK)

Advice Most CVs also have a key skills section, and some add projects, volunteering, languages, certifications or interests. Add a section when it supports the job and leave it out when it doesn't. When you have substantial work experience, work history usually comes before education; early in your career, education can come first.

For a UK CV, the National Careers Service advises leaving off your age, date of birth, marital status or nationality. Source: National Careers Service (UK)

Advice Conventions for photos and personal details differ between countries and employers, and this page doesn't list rules for each one. If a job advert outside the UK asks for something specific, follow the advert. The builder never adds personal details.

The introduction is a few short lines just under your contact details: who you are, what you want to do next, and one true result that shows you suit the role. Source: National Careers Service (UK) Headed “Profile” or “Personal statement”, it is the same thing; the builder lets you choose the heading. Write it in your own words and skip filler such as “hard-working team player”: the free checker flags phrases like that, and a specific result says more.

Advice A CV personal statement is a few lines. A university application personal statement is a different, longer piece of writing.

List jobs with the most recent first: job title, employer, place and dates on one line, then what you did, usually in two or three lines. Source: National Careers Service (UK) A useful pattern for each line is a verb, what you did, the scale (how many, how often, for whom) and the result (what changed). The National Careers Service suggests the STAR method (situation, task, action, result) for describing what you did. Include a number only when it's true and you could explain it at interview; a line without a number is better than a made-up one.

Weak vs strong, labelled by the checker engine

• Duty, not a result Responsible for payroll

  Action + number Ran monthly payroll for about 300 staff with no missed pay dates

• Duty, not a result Helped out with events when needed

  Vague or too short Organised 6 open evenings a year for up to 120 visitors

• Vague or too short Good communication skills

  Action + number Answered about 40 customer emails a shift and closed billing queries the same day

• Duty, not a result Worked on the stock system

  Action + number Moved weekly stock counts to a shared spreadsheet that cut counting time from two hours to one

• Action, no number Trained new staff on the till and returns process

  A good line already. If you have a true number (how many, how often), adding it makes the result easier to see; if you don’t, leave it as it is.

Action verbs

The 250 verbs the checker engine recognises as strong openers:

accelerated, achieved, acquired, adapted, addressed, administered, advanced, advised, advocated, analyzed, answered, applied, appointed, architected, arranged, assembled, assessed, audited, authored, automated, balanced, benchmarked, boosted, briefed, budgeted, built, calculated, campaigned, captured, centralized, chaired, championed, clarified, closed, coached, coded, collaborated, collected, combined, commissioned, communicated, compiled, completed, composed, computed, conceived, conceptualized, condensed, conducted, configured, consolidated, constructed, consulted, contracted, controlled, converted, convinced, coordinated, corrected, counseled, crafted, created, cultivated, cut, debugged, decreased, defined, delegated, delivered, demonstrated, deployed, designed, detected, determined, developed, devised, diagnosed, directed, discovered, documented, doubled, drafted, drove, earned, edited, educated, eliminated, enabled, encouraged, engineered, enhanced, established, estimated, evaluated, exceeded, executed, expanded, expedited, facilitated, forecast, forecasted, formalized, formed, formulated, founded, generated, grew, guided, halved, headed, hired, identified, implemented, improved, increased, influenced, initiated, innovated, inspected, installed, instituted, instructed, integrated, interviewed, introduced, invented, investigated, launched, led, lifted, lowered, maintained, managed, mapped, marketed, maximized, measured, mediated, mentored, merged, migrated, minimized, mobilized, modeled, modernized, monitored, motivated, negotiated, onboarded, opened, operated, optimized, orchestrated, owned, organized, originated, outperformed, overhauled, oversaw, partnered, performed, persuaded, piloted, pioneered, planned, prepared, presented, prioritized, processed, produced, programmed, projected, promoted, proposed, prototyped, proved, provided, published, purchased, qualified, raised, ran, rebuilt, recommended, reconciled, recruited, redesigned, reduced, reengineered, refined, regained, rehabilitated, reorganized, repaired, replaced, reported, represented, researched, resolved, restored, restructured, retained, revamped, reviewed, revised, revitalized, saved, scaled, scheduled, screened, secured, segmented, selected, shaped, shipped, shortened, simplified, sold, solved, sourced, spearheaded, specified, sped, stabilized, standardized, steered, streamlined, strengthened, structured, succeeded, supervised, surpassed, surveyed, sustained, synthesized, systematized, tested, trained, transformed, translated, tripled, troubleshot, turned, uncovered, unified, upgraded, validated, verified, won, wrote

Start with the skills the job advert asks for that you really have, then add other skills and tools you have used. Source: National Careers Service (UK) Back the important ones up with a line in your work experience, education or projects. Don't list a skill you couldn't talk about at interview. To compare your wording with a specific advert, paste both into the free checker.

Give each qualification's name, where you studied and the dates. Source: National Careers Service (UK) Write qualifications exactly as awarded, in your own words, with grades only if you want them considered; if it isn't finished, say so with “Expected” and a date. School leavers and students usually list their most recent qualifications in more detail; once you have a later qualification, earlier ones can be shortened.

Certifications and licences. A certification comes from a certifying organisation or vendor; a licence is permission to practise from a government or regulatory body. Label each correctly, name it exactly as issued, and list only ones you hold.

School leaver, student or no work experience. Put education straight after the introduction, then any jobs, projects, placements and volunteering. Source: National Careers Service (UK) Skills from projects, placements, volunteering and interests count when they are real, for example leadership from captaining a team.

Career change. Name the move in the first line of the introduction (“Moving into … from …”), choose lines that show work similar to the new job, and consider the skills-first layout so key skills come first while the timeline stays. Never relabel an old job title to look like the new field.

A gap in your CV. Gaps are common, and the National Careers Service treats them as normal. Source: National Careers Service (UK) You don't have to explain one on the CV; if you want to, use one honest line in your own words with the dates, and keep any longer explanation for the cover letter or the interview. Don't stretch other dates to cover it.

Font and style. A clear font such as Arial, Times New Roman or Calibri at size 11 or larger, one consistent style, headings and bullet points. Source: National Careers Service (UK)

Layout. One column with plain headings. Some application systems read multi-column layouts, tables and text boxes out of order; one column avoids the question. Keep your name and contact details in the body of the page, not in the page header area.

Length. Our view The National Careers Service doesn't set a page count. Two pages is common advice for experienced applicants and one page often suits school leavers; the test is whether every line helps the reader decide about this job. Academic CVs are longer by design.

PDF or Word. Send what the advert asks for. If it doesn't say, a PDF exported from a word processor keeps your layout; some application forms ask for Word (.docx). Either way the text must be selectable: a scanned image of a CV contains no text to read. The free checker reads PDF, DOCX and TXT files in your browser and shows the text it finds.

Experienced

School leaver, student or graduate

Career change

Returning after a gap

These are plain text, not Word or Google Docs files. Paste one into Word or Google Docs, keep one column, and save it as PDF or .docx, whichever the advert asks for.

Only list people who have agreed to be referees, such as a manager, teacher or someone from your community, and don't publish their contact details on the CV; say references are available on request instead. Source: National Careers Service (UK) The builder adds the line “References available on request.” only if you choose it.

Tailor it for each job. Copy the job title from the advert, put the lines that match the advert first, and use the advert's words for skills you really have. Source: National Careers Service (UK)

Check it. Ask someone to read it for spelling and grammar, and check your contact details. Source: National Careers Service (UK)

Name the file. Your name and “CV”, for example Priya-Example-CV.pdf, so it's easy to find.

Write the covering message. The cover letter builder works from the same facts, and the job search email builder has application and follow-up messages.

Also free: the resume builder for US applications, CV vs resume, the cover letter builder and interview prep. The National Careers Service also points to a free UK government CV builder from its CV guide.

Disclosure. TryHired sells HIRED, a paid job-search program. The builder, templates and examples are free and don't require it.