How Our ATS Score Works: The Full Rubric

• Keyword match (35): must-have and nice-to-have skills from the posting, weighted by importance and repetition, with true synonyms. Skills shown inside work bullets count more than a bare skills list.
• Job title (10): whether your resume uses the title recruiters will search for.
• Requirements fit (10): years of experience, degree level, certifications and clearance compared with the posting.
• Measurable results (10): bullets with numbers, percentages, money or scale, plus strong action verbs.
• ATS-friendly formatting (10): file type, readable text, tables, columns, text boxes, images and header or footer text.
• Sections (8): Experience, Education, Skills and Summary under standard headings.
• Searchability (7): email, phone, location and LinkedIn link.
• Language and style (6): weak phrases, clichés, repeated openings and first-person pronouns.
• Length (4): word count suited to the role.

Naming a category such as 'cloud' never earns credit for a specific tool such as AWS. Skills mentioned only in your contact header, school or employer names don't count. Project work earns skill credit but never adds professional years.

When we suggest edits, we never add employers, dates, degrees, certifications or numbers you didn't give us. Anything that depends on facts only you know is flagged 'only apply if true'.

For Word files, approved edits are written into the original document, so fonts, spacing and layout stay as you made them. When a safe in-place edit isn't possible, we rebuild the file and tell you so.