What Font Should You Use for Your Resume?
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When you’re creating your resume, every detail matters — from your bullet points and job titles to your spacing and design. One of the most overlooked elements when writing a resume? The font you choose.
Your resume font might seem like a small decision, but it plays a major role in how your resume stands out to both hiring managers and the applicant tracking system (ATS). The right font makes your resume look professional, polished, and easy to read, while the wrong one can make your document appear cluttered, outdated, or hard to scan.
If you’ve been wondering what font should you use for your resume, here’s your go-to guide for choosing the best typeface, font size, and overall resume format to make your resume shine — on screen, on paper, and in the hands of your next employer. Let’s take a look!
Why Resume Font Choice is an Important Consideration
Your font choice isn’t just about style — it’s about readability, consistency, and professionalism. Hiring managers spend only a few seconds scanning each resume, so you need a resume font that’s clean, modern, and easy to read at a glance.
💪 A strong resume typeface:
Makes your resume look professional and up to date.
Ensures your formatting stays consistent across devices and software.
Helps your resume stand out among other applicants.
Prevents formatting issues in applicant tracking systems.
The best resume fonts make your content effortless to skim. They highlight your skills, experience, and accomplishments while making your document look structured and professional.
Serif vs. Sans Serif Fonts
Before diving into the best fonts for a professional resume, it helps to know the difference between serif fonts and sans serif fonts:
Serif fonts (like Georgia or Cambria) have small decorative strokes at the ends of letters. They look classic, professional, and are great for traditional industries or printed versions of your resume.
Sans serif fonts (like Calibri, Arial, or Verdana) have clean edges and no extra strokes. These are modern, minimal, and often the most easy to read fonts on a computer screen.
🔶Tip: For digital applications, sans serif fonts tend to perform best. They translate well across systems, making them the correct font choice for an ATS-friendly resume.
Top 5 ATS-Friendly Resume Fonts
If you want a resume that looks professional and passes digital screening, these are the best fonts to use. Each one is clean, readable, and proven to display well across devices and Microsoft Word, Google Docs, and PDFs.
1. Calibri
Calibri is the modern standard — a simple, balanced, and easy to read sans serif font. Being the default font in Microsoft Word, it stays consistent across screens and software. It’s one of the best resume fonts for any industry and helps make your resume look clean and current without distraction.
2. Arial
Arial is a timeless sans serif font that always looks professional. It’s a great go-to font for job seekers who want a simple, clear design that’s fully compatible with any applicant tracking system.
3. Cambria
Cambria was designed specifically for on-screen readability, which makes it an excellent choice for online job applications. It’s a serif font that blends professionalism with digital clarity — perfect for professional documents viewed on a screen or printed copy.
4. Georgia
Georgia is another excellent serif font that’s readable at smaller sizes. It gives your resume a slightly more traditional, academic feel while still being modern enough for today’s job search.
5. Verdana
Verdana was built for the computer screen, offering wide letter spacing and clean shapes that make it one of the most easy-to-read fonts out there. It’s versatile, professional, and highly compatible with ATS software.
Fonts to Avoid on Your Resume
Choosing the wrong font can make even a great resume look unprofessional. Avoid decorative, outdated, or hard-to-read font styles like:
Comic Sans – overly casual and not suitable for professional documents.
Papyrus or Brush Script – too stylized and poor for readability.
Courier New – a monospaced font that feels outdated and tight.
Times New Roman – still common, but can appear dated in modern resume formats.
🔶Tip: If you’re tempted to try something creative or different, remember: in most creative fields, a clean, simple sans serif will still look best. You can show creativity through layout or design, not your typeface.
Resume Fonts and Formatting: Additional Guidelines
Once you’ve chosen the right font, make sure your formatting supports readability and professionalism.
✍️ Here are a few general resume formatting tips to follow:
Depending on career experience level, keep your layout consistent across one page or three pages.
Use clear section headings to organize your job titles, education, and experience.
Use bold and italics only to emphasize key points — not decoration.
Avoid using more than two fonts on your resume to maintain consistency.
Leave enough white space to make your resume feel open and easy to scan.
Ensure your text is fully aligned (left or justified — never centered).
Use 10–12 pt font size for body text.
Use 14–16 pt for your name and section headings.
Keep margins between 0.5–1 inch for good balance and white space.
Test how your resume prints before sending.
Following these resume formatting tips ensures your document looks crisp, readable, and professional from every angle!
Looking for Professional Resume Writing Support?
Choosing the right resume font is just one part of creating a polished, professional job application. If you want materials that are strategically written, visually consistent, and tailored to your career goals, ResumeSpice can help.
Our team of professional resume writers, cover letter experts, and LinkedIn profile specialists knows exactly what hiring managers look for — and how to build a cohesive personal brand across every platform. Beyond writing services, ResumeSpice also offers personalized career coaching, interview preparation, and other resources to help you navigate your career with confidence.
