Tech resumes that pass ATS and impress hiring managers

What hiring managers in tech actually want

Tech hiring is a paradox: the role you're applying for might be highly specialised, but the resume that gets you there has to be legible to a recruiter who isn't. A good tech CV leads with named systems (the AWS service, the framework version, the database engine) rather than capability claims, because named systems are what both ATS keyword passes and hiring managers' pattern-matching latch onto. Quantify scale — qps, dau, dataset size, cluster size, team size — wherever you can; "reduced p99 latency 40%" is a thousand times stronger than "improved system performance." Skip the years-of-experience-per-language list; it's noise that signals lack of confidence. Pair every bullet with a specific outcome a non-technical person can grasp: shipped, scaled, cut, eliminated, blocked.

Common ATS keywords for tech resumes

Terms ATS keyword filters typically scan for in this industry. Use them when they describe work you actually did — never as filler.

• Python
• TypeScript
• React
• AWS
• Kubernetes
• PostgreSQL
• CI/CD
• Distributed systems
• Microservices
• Agile
• Code review
• On-call

Resume guides for top tech roles

• Software Engineer
  Show what you built, what you shipped, and what broke on the way — not a tech stack roll call.
• Frontend Engineer
  Performance budgets, accessibility, design-system ownership — the work backend-leaning CVs leave invisible.
• Backend Engineer
  API design, data integrity, throughput — the parts of the system that don't have screenshots.
• Full Stack Engineer
  Show that 'full stack' means real depth at both ends, not 'I touched both at some point'.
• DevOps Engineer
  Pipelines, infrastructure-as-code, reliability — the work that's invisible when it works.
• Site Reliability Engineer
  SLOs you owned, incidents you led, toil you killed — the production-engineering CV.
• Machine Learning Engineer
  Production ML systems, latency budgets, and the infrastructure decisions that separate engineering from notebooking.
• Product Manager
  Outcomes you owned, decisions you made, and what got cut — not a list of features the team shipped.
• Engineering Manager
  Team outcomes, hiring quality, and difficult calls — not a bullet list of features your team shipped.
• UX Designer
  Research, flows, and outcomes — show that 'UX' means decisions you made, not just wireframes you drew.

Related guides

• How to write achievement bullets that land interviews
  Most resume bullets describe duties. Interview-worthy bullets describe wins. Here's the structural difference, and a six-minute exercise to fix every line on your CV.
• Action verbs that actually impress recruiters (with examples)
  Lists of '200 power verbs' are everywhere and mostly useless. Here's a smaller, sharper set — organised by what the verb is actually claiming — with worked examples.
• How ATS systems actually parse your resume
  What an applicant tracking system really does with your CV — and the three structural choices that determine whether it understands your experience or throws it away.