One of the most often inquiries I receive from job searchers as a recruiter is, “How many pages should my resume be?”

There is a lot of contradicting advice regarding the greatest situations for one-page resumes, the best situations for two-page resumes, and the primary goal of your resume in the first place! I will thus clarify this.

The length of a resume for professionals, college students, and other groups will be covered in this article. You will know how many pages to build your resume after reading this page.

Make sure to read all the way to the end because I’m going to provide some of my BEST advice on how to improve your resume so you can land more interviews when you apply for jobs.

Let’s get going…

How Many Pages Should a Resume Be?

The fewest number of pages possible should be used on your resume to convey your worth and experience that is pertinent to the position you are applying for. However, if you feel that you have additional pertinent experience, achievements, or qualifications to present, you shouldn’t feel constrained to a particular page length or word count. Your resume should never contain unnecessary words or paragraphs.

Never put irrelevant or unnecessary info on your resume to make it longer

Do not attempt to lengthen or stuff your resume with unnecessary information. No hiring manager will choose to interview you simply because your resume was longer than the competition.

(Continue reading to see what their top criteria are and what your resume must accomplish in order to land interviews.)

The only circumstance in which the aforementioned rule does not apply is if your resume’s content does not even appear on page one. In that instance, strive to fill up the entire page with your resume because it will look better.

On the other hand, you should write pertinent abilities, encounters, and other credentials that you believe show you’ll be a good fit for the position you’ve applied for. The secret is in the last sentence; you should always “tailor” your resume to the job description.

But after including all the pertinent information you can, end. Your resume won’t impress hiring managers or recruiters if you add unnecessary content only to make it longer.

Your resume has one main purpose: To show the employer that you have the skills and experience to step into their role and be successful.

Therefore, if something is hindering you from doing that, it is damaging you (by making it more difficult for the hiring manager to get the pertinent information)!

Take it off, for instance, if you worked at a pointless job 15 years ago and have subsequently established a whole different career!

Alternatively, if only 10 of your listed 25 abilities apply to your present line of work, remove the remaining 15!

If you leave them there, the hiring manager or recruiter will have a harder time finding the information that will compel them to conduct an interview with you. Therefore, by omitting crucial information from your CV, you risk losing out on interviews.

How long should a resume be for a college student?

A one-page CV is usually sufficient for the average student or recent graduate who is starting their job search. As an entry-level job applicant, it’s usually always viable to condense your relevant schooling, technical abilities, internships, and prior work experience onto a single page.

There are, however, certain exceptions. Even as an entry-level job seeker, you can find yourself utilizing a two-page resume if you’ve held many jobs and internships, have published articles and studies, or are a Ph.D. student with a lot of experience. This is appropriate and won’t cost you any jobs.

How long should a resume be for a professional?

In the first five to seven years of their employment, a professional may typically condense their experience into a one-page resume. After that, your resume will normally need to be two pages long in order to contain all of the relevant information. Managers and executives seeking employment will need a two-page or perhaps three-page resume.

Depending on how technical your line of work is, whether licenses or certifications are necessary, etc., your resume may also require extra pages.

This is why you should adhere to the advice from the opening section of this article and constantly evaluate each component of your resume. “Is this information helping me demonstrate that I’ll be successful in this next position?” you could ask. If the response is “no,” think about taking that element out.

How many words should a resume be?

It is not helpful to count the words on your CV when trying to land a new job. This won’t help you get more job interviews and isn’t a factor that hiring managers will take into account. Because of this, it is impossible to determine the precise word count for a resume and there is no need to keep track of it while producing one.

To demonstrate that you are prepared to start your next job and succeed, concentrate on highlighting your prior work, successes, and talents. The number of words is unimportant.

How far back should a resume go?

If you’re a seasoned applicant, you could begin to wonder how far back your resume ought to go as well.

So let’s discuss when you can begin deleting previous jobs.

As a general rule, if a prior position is more than 10 years old and isn’t pertinent to the jobs you’re applying for now, you can delete it.

As a result, if you are an executive, you may choose to begin the work history section of your resume with the start of your management career or your first position in your present field. No need to go any deeper into the past.

Leave the job if you still believe it shows you have what it takes to succeed in the roles you are now applying for.

The amount of history on your resume should be up to you. The final line is that you should quit a previous position if it is demonstrating to the employer that you are a perfect fit. Cut that experience if it isn’t helpful in getting you the job and isn’t related to your current position.

Never Sacrifice Resume Formatting and Readability to Fit a Certain Page Length

As a recruiter, I’ve heard tales of applicants reducing the font size, adjusting line spacing, etc. to fit more information on a single page.

Never compromise your resume’s readability or general formatting to make it fit on a particular number of pages.

In extreme circumstances, I’ve observed candidates who had their font size down to 8 or 9 since they had been informed that their resume should only be one page long. That is lousy career advice, and as was mentioned before, it depends on your particular circumstances.

You’ll land more interviews if you concentrate on delivering insightful material and make your formatting appealing, well-spaced, and simple to read for hiring managers.

That gets me to my next advice for resume formatting and page length.

Use ample spacing and short, easily-readable paragraphs when writing your resume

Massive blocks of text on a resume are the one thing that turns hiring managers and recruiters off the fastest. (See illustration below.

Instead of arranging your resume in this way, add more bullet points or divide lengthy paragraphs into two or three smaller paragraphs, separating them with some white space. (Most people, though, are better suited to utilizing bullets and a brief paragraph describing the broader purpose before the bullets.)

Example of how the page would look:

For more full resume work history examples, read this article.

Sections to Include on Your Resume to Get More Interviews

Now that you know how long a resume should be, I’ll give you some advice on what to include there in order to land interviews.

More essential than thinking about how many pages your resume should be in writing excellent content.

And regardless of how long your resume ends up becoming, there are a few essential sections you should never exclude if you want to land more interviews. Thus, here they are…

You should start by writing a strong resume summary paragraph. Here are some instances.

Next, check to see that your work experience part is generally GREAT. The majority of the time, as a recruiter, I skip right to this section of resumes.

Because employers prefer to see WHERE you used each talent and completed each task in your career, skills are less significant. In order to show employers your value, concentrate mostly on your career history and bullet points… After you’ve done that, a Skills section is still beneficial to include, though. It enables you to add pertinent keywords to your resume and quickly highlight your best skills for the employer.

You should also include a section on your education, emphasizing any degrees and certifications you may have. Those are the primary components you should add, in my opinion.

Read the entire post on essential resume sections and titles for extra assistance putting everything together.

We also have a thorough post on what to include on a resume and how to organize it all.

You may use that as another tool to ensure that your resume, whether it is one page, two pages, or more, makes the best use of its available space.

Conclusion: How Long Should a Resume Be?

If you read and use the following suggestions, you’ll have a strong resume with the appropriate number of pages for your circumstance.

Just keep in mind that the purpose of your resume is to highlight your most pertinent experience and training in order to secure an interview. Never lose sight of that fundamental goal by getting caught up in counting pages.

You won’t be able to write the greatest resume possible if you become preoccupied and start stressing excessively about how long your resume should be.

The bottom line is that your resume should be as long as it takes to demonstrate all of your relevant skills and demonstrate that you are a strong candidate for the position you are applying for. When you’ve completed that, it shouldn’t be an issue anymore.