Developer CVs: A Different Market

Tech recruiting has its own rules. Recruiters spend an average of 7 seconds on a CV — in tech, that window can be even shorter when a posting attracts 200 applications in 48 hours. And unlike other sectors, your CV will often be reviewed by a senior developer or CTO before it ever reaches HR.

That means two things: substance matters enormously (your stack, your projects, your results), and presentation must be impeccable — readable, clutter-free, perfectly structured to pass automated screening systems.

In practice, a tech recruiter scans four things first: your job title, your main stack, your most recent context, and whether your experience looks real at the scale you claim.

What a tech recruiter checks in the first 10 seconds

Before anyone reads your CV carefully, they usually want to answer these questions fast:

what kind of developer are you?
which stack do you use most?
what kind of products did you work on?
did you ship, scale, automate or improve something concrete?
do your links and sections look credible and current?

If one of those points is blurry, the rest of the document becomes harder to trust.

What Your Developer CV Must Contain

1. A Targeted Title and Profile Summary

Your profile summary is the first thing read. It needs to answer three questions in 2-3 lines:

Who are you? (level, specialisation)
What is your primary stack?
What kind of role are you targeting?

Junior example:

"Full-stack web developer, recently graduated (CS degree, 2025). Primary stack: React / Node.js / PostgreSQL. Looking for a first role at a startup or scale-up in London or remotely."

Senior example:

"Lead backend developer with 8 years' experience in Python/Django, microservices architecture and AWS. Scaled systems to 2M+ users. Targeting Staff Engineer or Technical Lead positions."

Skip "passionate about development since childhood." Tech recruiters have seen that phrase 500 times.

2. Technical Stack: Precision and Honesty

The skills section is critical in a developer CV. Two traps to avoid:

The laundry list trap: listing 40 technologies with no distinction, from Python to Photoshop via XML. This convinces no one and damages your credibility.

The over-claiming trap: calling yourself "expert" in React after 3 months of tutorials.

Recommended structure:

Languages: Python (expert), JavaScript/TypeScript (advanced), Go (basics)
Frameworks: Django, FastAPI, React, Next.js
Databases: PostgreSQL, Redis, MongoDB
Tools / DevOps: Docker, Git, CI/CD (GitHub Actions), AWS (EC2, S3, Lambda)
Methods: Agile/Scrum, TDD, code review

Also separate what you use confidently from what you have only touched briefly. A shorter, honest stack is far more credible than a giant keyword dump.

For level conventions, read our guide on how to present IT skills on a CV.

3. Experience: Projects and Results, Not a Job Description

A tech recruiter doesn't want to read "Developed web applications following best practices." They want to know:

What type of project you worked on (B2B SaaS, marketplace, mobile app, public API...)
With which stack and architecture
At what scale (thousands of users? millions of requests/day?)
What was your measurable impact

Bad format:

Developed features on the web application. Participated in code reviews. Worked in an Agile team.

Good format:

Rebuilt the payment module (Stripe + webhooks) for 40,000 active users — reduced transaction errors by 60%. Stack: React, Node.js, PostgreSQL. Event-driven architecture, 85% test coverage.

Use action verbs suited to tech: architected, refactored, migrated, deployed, automated, optimised, implemented, scaled...

4. Personal Projects and Open Source

If you're junior or career-changing, your GitHub projects matter as much as internships. Add a dedicated section:

Project name + one-line description
Stack used
GitHub link or live URL
Metrics if available (GitHub stars, users...)

For seniors, notable open source contributions or maintained libraries significantly boost credibility.

GitHub and portfolio: what to show

If you include GitHub, make sure it supports your story. A strong GitHub profile is not about quantity. It is about relevance.

Show projects that make one of these things obvious:

technical depth;
clean code and documentation;
real deployment or usage;
continuity over time;
strong fit with the role you are targeting.

If your GitHub is mostly abandoned experiments, it may need curating before you put it on the CV.

5. Education

For developer CVs, certifications increasingly carry weight alongside degrees. AWS, Google Cloud, Kubernetes CKA, and recognised specialisations have their place if relevant. Read our guide on how to present education on a CV.

No CS degree? What matters instead

Many strong developers do not come from a traditional computer science path. If that is your case, the CV needs to compensate with clearer proof elsewhere.

What helps most:

substantial projects;
visible technical progression;
deployed work;
freelance or production experience;
recognised certifications when relevant;
a coherent explanation of your route into tech.

If you are junior, self-taught or changing careers, also read CV with no experience, CV for career changers and our recent graduate CV guide.

Recommended Structure for a Developer CV

Header: name, title, email, phone, LinkedIn, GitHub, portfolio
Profile summary (3-4 lines max)
Technical stack (structured by category)
Professional experience (reverse chronological, measurable results)
Projects (personal or open source, if relevant)
Education
Languages (technical English is often expected)

Most Common Mistakes on Developer CVs

Listing Obsolete Technologies Without Context

Flash, jQuery, SOAP, CodeIgniter... Highlighting these can hurt you. Mention them only if the historical context of a project is relevant.

Ignoring ATS

Many developers underestimate automated screening. Even major tech companies pass CVs through an ATS first. Read our guide on ATS optimisation — "React.js" and "React" can be two different tokens depending on the system.

Sacrificing Readability

A CV with unreadable typography, misaligned columns or an exotic font doesn't land well — even in tech. The CV types recruiters prefer always list readability as criterion #1.

Including Everything

No need to list your beginner-level Perl from 2008. Be selective about what goes on your CV based on what it adds for your target.

Junior vs Senior Developer CV: Key Differences

| | Junior | Senior | | ----------------- | ------------------------------------ | --------------------------------------- | | Profile summary | Stack + school + target company type | Stack + specialisation + past impact | | Experience | Internships, projects, work-study | High-impact projects, leadership, scale | | Personal projects | Very important | Optional but valuable | | Education | At the top | At the bottom | | Length | 1 page | 1-2 pages |

A note on English and international applications

If you are applying to an international company, a remote-first employer or a startup with English as working language, an English CV may be expected even if the company is not based in the UK or US.

In that case, also make sure your language level section is credible and that you follow the right conventions from our guide to writing a CV in English.

Create Your Developer CV in Minutes

CV Creator offers ATS-compatible templates designed to showcase a technical stack and measurable achievements — no sign-up required, one-time €2, unlimited CVs for 24 hours.

Developer CV: The Complete Guide to Landing a Tech Interview