A resume is not a CV, and length is not a virtue

In the United States, the document you send to a private employer is a resume — a short, targeted marketing document, not a complete record of your working life. The word CV is reserved for academia, medicine, and research, where a long publication list is the point.

That distinction drives everything else about US formatting. A resume is expected to be one page for most candidates. Two pages are acceptable once you have roughly ten or more years of relevant experience. Three pages signals that you could not decide what mattered.

This matters more in a slow hiring market. The August 2026 jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics put unemployment at 4.1 percent, with 162,000 jobs added — a strong month against an average monthly gain of only 31,000 over the prior twelve months. Hiring is happening, but employers are being selective and each opening draws a deep pile. A tight, specific resume is what gets read.

What goes at the top

Your header is four lines at most:

• Full name, in the largest type on the page.
• City and state — "Austin, TX" is enough. Never your full street address.
• Phone number and a professional email address (firstname.lastname@ works; nicknames do not).
• LinkedIn URL and, if relevant to your field, a portfolio or GitHub link.

Then, directly beneath it, a professional summary: two or three lines naming your role, your years of experience, and one concrete result. Skip the old-fashioned "Objective" statement. It describes what you want; a summary describes what you deliver.

What must never appear on a US resume

This is where applicants trained in other countries lose interviews before anyone reads a word about their skills. Federal anti-discrimination law — enforced by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission — makes it unlawful to hire based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, or genetic information. Employers protect themselves by refusing to look at any of it.

Leave all of the following off your resume:

• A photograph. Many recruiters will discard a resume with a headshot rather than risk a bias claim.
• Date of birth, age, or graduation years from decades ago.
• Marital status, number of children, gender, religion, or nationality.
• Your Social Security number — a resume containing one is an identity-theft risk, not a credential.
• "References available upon request." Employers assume it and will ask when they are ready.

If you are applying from outside the country or on a student visa, do not write your immigration status into the body of the document either. There is a correct place and a correct wording for that, covered in our guide to work authorization on your resume.

The reverse-chronological structure recruiters expect

Unless you have a specific reason to do otherwise, use the standard order:

1. Header

2. Professional summary

3. Experience — most recent job first

4. Skills

5. Education

6. Certifications, licenses, or projects, if they help

Functional resumes that hide dates behind a wall of "core competencies" are read as a cover-up for gaps. If you have gaps, address them plainly rather than restructuring the whole document around them.

For each role, write the employer, your job title, the city and state, and the month-and-year range. Then three to five bullet points.

Bullet points that survive a six-second scan

Every bullet should start with a strong past-tense verb and, wherever possible, end with a number. The gap between a duty and an accomplishment is the gap between a rejection and a phone screen.

• Weak: Responsible for customer service in the call center.
• Strong: Handled 60+ inbound support calls per day, keeping customer satisfaction at 94% across 18 months.

Numbers do not have to be revenue. Volume, headcount, turnaround time, error rate, retention, and percentage improvements all work. If you genuinely have no metrics, describe scope and outcome: what you owned, what changed because you owned it.

Formatting that a machine can actually read

Most applications in the US pass through an applicant tracking system before a person sees them. That software parses your file into database fields, and a design-forward layout is what breaks it.

Keep to a single column. Use standard section headings — "Experience," not "Where I've Made My Mark." Avoid tables, text boxes, columns, headers and footers, icons, and graphics. Use a common font at 10–12 points, with real bullet characters. Submit a .docx file unless the posting specifically asks for PDF, and name the file Firstname-Lastname-Resume.docx.

The full mechanics are in our guide on how to get past the ATS.

Tailor it, every single time

One generic resume sent to forty postings performs worse than four tailored resumes. Read the job description, pull out the language it uses for the skills and tools you actually have, and mirror that language in your summary, your bullets, and your skills section. If the posting says "stakeholder management" and your resume says "dealing with clients," you are invisible to both the keyword filter and the recruiter skimming for a match.

Once the resume is right, the cover letter is what explains the parts a bullet list cannot.

You can build a clean, single-column, ATS-safe resume for free on Monta meu currículo? — no account, and your data stays on your own device.

Frequently Asked Questions

Should a US resume be one page or two?

One page for students, career changers, and anyone with under roughly ten years of relevant experience. Two pages are fine for senior professionals with a deep, relevant track record. Never go beyond two pages for a private-sector role.

Do I put a photo on a resume in the United States?

No. Because of federal anti-discrimination law, most US employers will not accept a resume with a photo, and some recruiters are instructed to discard them unread.

Should I send my resume as a PDF or a Word document?

Send a .docx file unless the posting asks for PDF. Word files parse more reliably in older applicant tracking systems. Whichever you choose, never send a scanned image or a design file.

Is a professional summary or an objective better?

A summary. An objective says what you are looking for; a summary says what you bring, with a number attached. Recruiters read the summary as the pitch and skip the objective entirely.