How to make an ATS-friendly CV that software can read

When you apply through a company’s careers page or a large job portal, your CV may be read by software before any person sees it. That software is called an applicant tracking system, or ATS. It is not a robot judge, and the scary stories about it are often exaggerated, but it does read CVs differently from a human. A CV that is easy for an ATS to read is also easy for a busy recruiter to read, so the effort pays off either way.

What an ATS actually does

An ATS is the database recruiters use to manage applications. In general it does three things:

1. Parses your CV: it pulls out the text and tries to sort it into fields such as name, contact details, job titles, employers, dates, education and skills.
2. Stores and searches it: recruiters search and filter candidates by keywords, job titles, qualifications or location.
3. Shows it to a person: the recruiter reads either the parsed profile or your original file.

The common failure is not rejection by a clever algorithm. It is a parsing mistake: your job titles end up in the wrong field, your dates disappear, or your skills are trapped inside an image, so a keyword search never finds you.

Does this matter for jobs in Bangladesh?

It depends on the employer. Multinationals, large local groups, banks, international NGOs and employers abroad are the most likely to use an online application system. Job portals such as BDJobs usually have you fill in a structured profile, and your uploaded CV sits alongside it. Many smaller companies simply read CVs that arrive by email.

You rarely know which route your CV will take, so the practical answer is to make one clean version that works for software and people, and keep a more designed version for situations where you hand it over in person.

Layout: simple beats clever

Most parsing problems come from layout. Software reads text in order, and fancy layouts scramble that order.

• Use a single column. Two-column designs can be read across both columns line by line, mixing your skills into your job history.
• Avoid tables and text boxes for main content. Some systems skip text inside them entirely.
• Keep important text out of the header and footer area of the document. Put your name and contact details in the main body at the top.
• No text in images. A skills chart, an icon-only phone number or a logo with your name in it can’t be read as text.
• Skip skill bars and star ratings. “Excel ★★★★☆” means nothing to software, and not much to people either. Write the skill in words.

Simple doesn’t mean ugly. Good spacing, one clear font, bold job titles and a thin line between sections look professional and parse cleanly. Our professional CV templates include an ATS-friendly category built exactly this way.

Use the section headings software expects

An ATS looks for familiar section names to know where things go. Creative headings like “My Journey” or “Where I’ve Been” can confuse it. Stick to standard ones:

• Profile Summary (or Career Objective)
• Work Experience
• Education
• Skills
• Certifications, Projects, Languages, References

Within each job, keep the order consistent: job title, employer, location, dates, then bullet points. Write dates the same way every time, for example “Jan 2023 – Present” or “01/2023 – 06/2025”, so the system can work out how long you held each role.

Match keywords honestly

Recruiters search an ATS with the words from their own job post. If the post asks for “bank reconciliation” and your CV only says “matching accounts”, a search may miss you even though you have done the work.

How to do it properly

1. Read the job post and list the skills, tools, qualifications and job titles it mentions.
2. Tick the ones you genuinely have.
3. Use the employer’s exact wording for those, in your summary, your skills section and the bullet points where you used them.
4. Spell out abbreviations once, for example “Search Engine Optimization (SEO)”, so both versions can be found.

Your job title matters too. If your official title was unusual, such as “Executive, Growth”, you can write it as “Executive, Growth (Digital Marketing)” so it matches what people search for, as long as that honestly describes the role.

File type, file name and fonts

Follow the employer’s instructions first. If none are given, a text-based PDF or a Word file (.docx) is usually safe. The key words are “text-based”: a PDF exported from a document or a CV builder contains real text, while a scanned page or a photo saved as PDF is just a picture.

• Name the file clearly: “Rakib-Hasan-CV.pdf”, not “final_final_new(2).pdf”.
• Use common fonts such as Arial, Calibri, Georgia or Garamond, at 10 to 12 points for body text.
• Avoid unusual symbols as bullets; a plain round bullet or a dash is safest.

What about the photo and personal details?

The Bangladesh CV format traditionally includes a photo and a block of personal details such as parents’ names, date of birth and addresses. An ATS will normally just ignore a photo, so it rarely breaks anything, but it does take up space and some international employers prefer not to receive one.

A sensible approach:

• For local employers who expect the traditional format, keep the photo and the details, in a simple layout.
• For multinationals and jobs abroad, leave out the photo and personal details unless asked, and use a profile summary.
• Either way, put the photo in the body of the page, not in the header area, and make sure your name and contact details are typed text, not part of an image.

Our guide on how to create a professional CV covers the local conventions in more detail.

How to test your CV before you send it

You can check most problems yourself in five minutes:

1. The copy test. Open your PDF, select all the text, copy it and paste it into a plain text editor such as Notepad. If the text comes out in the right order with nothing missing, software can read it too.
2. The search test. Use Ctrl+F (or Find) in the PDF to search for a key skill. If it isn’t found, it’s probably inside an image.
3. The portal preview. Many job portals show you the profile they extracted from your upload. Check it and fix anything that landed in the wrong place.
4. The phone test. Open the file on your phone. Recruiters read on phones too.

A quick ATS-friendly checklist

• Single column, no text boxes, no tables for main content
• Name and contact details as text at the top of the page body
• Standard section headings in a familiar order
• Job title, employer, location and consistent dates for every role
• Keywords from the job post, used honestly where they apply
• Skills written as words, not bars or icons
• A text-based PDF or .docx with a clear file name
• Passed the copy test and the search test

The quickest route is to start from a layout that is already clean. You can create a professional CV online with our builder, pick one of the free ATS-friendly templates such as ATS Classic or Harvard, and download it as a text-based PDF. If you later want a more designed look for handing out in person, switch templates and your content comes with you. The same tool is available as a resume builder if you are applying to employers who use that word.