ATS-Friendly Resume Template: Simple Layouts That Still Parse in 2026

Start with an ats friendly resume template that uses one column and plain text. Put your name, contact details, summary, skills, experience, and education in a clear vertical order. Use standard headings, normal bullet points, and a readable font. Avoid design elements that place text in separate objects.

For applications through company sites and LinkedIn Easy Apply, save the file in the format the employer requests. A Word version in .docx is a practical default when no format is stated. A PDF can preserve the visual layout, but only use it when the application accepts PDF. Keep both versions available.

The safest resume section order

Use this wireframe as your base template:

YOUR NAME
City, State | Phone | Email | LinkedIn URL | Portfolio URL

SUMMARY
Two or three lines about your experience, target role, and strongest relevant results.

SKILLS
Skill or tool | Skill or tool | Skill or tool | Skill or tool

EXPERIENCE
Job Title, Employer, City, State                                      Dates
- Accomplishment or responsibility with a result.
- Accomplishment or responsibility with a result.

Previous Job Title, Employer, City, State                             Dates
- Accomplishment or responsibility with a result.
- Accomplishment or responsibility with a result.

EDUCATION
Degree, School, City, State                                           Graduation year

OPTIONAL EXTRAS
Certifications, projects, volunteer work, languages, or relevant training

This order keeps the most useful information easy to find. You can move Education above Experience if you are a student, recent graduate, or applying to a role where your degree is a main requirement. Keep the section names recognizable. Use Summary, not a decorative label such as My Story.

ATS-friendly formatting rules

A parser reads the text and structure of a file. It does not need visual decoration. Build the document with these settings:

Resume element	Safer choice	Avoid
Layout	One column, left aligned	Two columns, sidebars, floating sections
File	.docx when requested, PDF when accepted	Image-only PDF or scanned document
Font	Calibri, Arial, or Georgia	Decorative, script, or very narrow fonts
Font size	10 to 12 pt for body text	Tiny text used to fit more content
Margins	Standard margins, about 0.5 to 1 inch	Extremely narrow margins
Headings	Summary, Skills, Experience, Education	Creative labels that hide the section purpose
Contact details	Typed text in the main document	Header-only contact details, icons, or images
Lists	Standard round bullets or short paragraphs	Shapes, symbols, or text inside graphics
Dates	Consistent text such as Jan 2022 to Mar 2024	Dates placed in floating boxes

Calibri and Arial are simple choices for Word and Google Docs. Georgia can work when you want a more traditional look, as long as the text remains readable. Set body text to 10 to 12 pt. Use a slightly larger size for your name and section headings, but do not let headings dominate the page.

Do not use text boxes. Do not use tables for layout. Do not use icons for your phone, email, or location. Do not include a photo unless a local requirement or a specific role asks for one. Do not use a multi-column skill grid. These features can cause text to be read out of order, dropped, or grouped incorrectly.

Downloadable-style plain-text example

Build the document from ordinary text, headings, and bullets. This sample shows the structure without relying on a visual template:

MAYA PATEL
Austin, TX | 512-555-0148 | mayapatel@email.com | linkedin.com/in/mayapatel

SUMMARY
Customer success specialist with 5 years of experience supporting B2B SaaS customers, improving onboarding, and reducing escalations. Skilled in Zendesk, Salesforce, product training, and renewal support.

SKILLS
Customer Success | Account Management | Zendesk | Salesforce | Onboarding | Product Training | Churn Reduction | SQL Reporting

EXPERIENCE
Customer Success Specialist, Northstar Software, Austin, TX                    May 2021 to Present
- Managed onboarding for 45 new accounts per quarter and raised first-90-day product adoption by 18%.
- Built a Zendesk triage process that reduced average response time by 22%.
- Partnered with sales and product teams to support renewals for accounts worth $1.4M annually.

Customer Support Representative, BrightDesk, Austin, TX                        Jun 2019 to Apr 2021
- Resolved an average of 55 customer cases per week while maintaining a 96% quality rating.
- Created product guides that cut repeated setup questions by 15%.

EDUCATION
Bachelor of Business Administration, Texas State University, San Marcos, TX, 2019

CERTIFICATIONS
Salesforce Associate | Zendesk Support Administrator

This is a plain-text pattern, not a finished resume for every job. Replace the content with your own evidence. Keep employer names, job titles, dates, and bullets in the normal document flow. You can add a Projects, Certifications, Languages, or Volunteer Experience section when it supports the job.

How to customize the template for one job

Tailor the content, not the document structure. First, read the job description and mark the required tools, skills, job titles, certifications, and recurring phrases. Add truthful matches to your Summary, Skills, and Experience sections.

If the posting says “customer onboarding,” use that exact phrase when your work included customer onboarding. Do not replace it with a vague phrase such as “client help.” If the posting uses an abbreviation and a full term, include both when accurate, such as “search engine optimization (SEO).”

Use the same main headings in every version. Add or remove optional sections only when they help. Keep the font, margins, bullet style, and file type consistent. Do not move key information into a sidebar to save space.

For each relevant role, select the strongest five to seven bullets. Put the most related bullets first. A good bullet states the action, the work, and the result when a result is available:

Weak: Responsible for customer onboarding.

Stronger: Led onboarding for 45 new accounts per quarter and raised first-90-day product adoption by 18%.

Only include numbers you can support. Do not add a keyword to a bullet if you have never used the tool or performed the task.

Three layouts that can fail parsing

1. Two-column resume with a skills sidebar

A sidebar may be read after the main column, before it, or in a mixed order. Contact details and skills can become separated from the rest of the file. A hiring team may still see a polished design, but the extracted text may not follow the intended sequence.

Use one column instead. Put Skills below Summary and above Experience.

2. Resume built from text boxes

Text boxes position content visually. They do not always behave like normal paragraphs. A parser may omit a box, split a sentence, or read dates away from their job titles.

Type each section directly into the document body. Use paragraph alignment and spacing for placement.

3. Resume using icons, graphics, or a multi-column skill grid

An envelope icon is not reliable contact text. A skill bar may be an image or a set of shapes. A grid can break skills into fragments or cause them to be read in an unexpected order.

Write your email, phone number, location, and skills as text. Separate skills with commas, bullets, or vertical bars. Keep the list readable for a person as well as a parser.

Run a plain-text paste test

A plain-text paste test is a quick way to find missing or scrambled content. Open the finished resume. Select all text. Copy it into a plain-text editor or a blank document with formatting removed. Read the pasted version from top to bottom.

Check that your name and contact details appear first. Confirm that headings remain attached to the correct sections. Make sure job titles, employers, dates, and bullets are in the right order. Look for missing symbols, broken URLs, odd characters, and duplicated text.

A public tool such as Jobscan can help compare resume language with a job description. Resume Worded can help flag wording and presentation issues. Canva is useful for visual design, but a Canva resume still needs a text extraction test. ChatGPT can help tailor bullets or identify terms in a posting. None of these tools can prove that your file will parse or rank the same way in a particular employer's ATS.

YourUnique.cv lets you paste a job description and get a resume written for that role. Still run the plain-text paste test before submitting.

Apply-today checklist

• Save the correct file type. Use .docx or PDF according to the application instructions.
• Keep one column and standard headings: Summary, Skills, Experience, and Education.
• Add truthful skills and phrases from the job description.
• Put your five strongest relevant bullets near the top of each related role.
• Use Calibri, Arial, or Georgia at 10 to 12 pt with standard margins.
• Remove text boxes, layout tables, icons, photos, and multi-column skill grids.
• Paste the resume into a plain-text document and check the reading order.
• Open the final file once before uploading it.