Applicant Tracking System (ATS)

When you apply through an online form or a careers page, your CV usually lands in an ATS before it reaches a person. The system keeps every application for the role in one place, and most systems also parse your file: they pull out your name, contact details, job titles, dates, education and skills and save them as separate fields.

Recruiters then work inside the ATS. They search the pool for skills or job titles, filter by location or experience, move candidates through stages such as “screened” or “interview”, and leave notes for the hiring team. Some systems add knock-out questions or a match score; how much of the ranking is automated varies from one system — and one employer — to the next.

An ATS rarely “rejects” you on its own — but a CV it can't read well is hard to find. The usual problems:

• Unusual layouts. Text inside images, text boxes or complex tables can be skipped or jumbled.
• Creative headings. “Where I've been” instead of “Experience” can leave a whole section unrecognised.
• Missing keywords. If the skills and titles from the job description never appear, a recruiter's search may not surface you.
• Inconsistent dates. Mixed formats make your history harder to read as a timeline.

An ATS-friendly CV avoids all four: real text, standard section names, consistent dates and the keywords for the role.

Twin CV's ATS score reads your CV the way screening software would and scores it out of 100, with a short summary and 3–8 concrete fixes. Name a target role and the keyword check is weighted for it. For one specific posting, the JD matcher lists the keywords your CV is missing. Both tools are part of the Premium plan. For strict application portals, download your CV in the Plain ATS design — one column of real text; see the CV designs.