Why formatting rules exist
An ATS parser is a text extractor first, a scorer second. Before it can score your resume against the JD, it has to correctly read your name, dates, section titles, and bullet points. The 5 things below are where extraction goes wrong most often. Fix them and your resume becomes machine-readable to every major ATS.
The 5 ATS-safe fonts
In 2026 there are five fonts every ATS platform (Workday, Greenhouse, Lever, iCIMS, Taleo, SmartRecruiters, BambooHR) parses cleanly, in every version:
Sans-serif (best for on-screen reading)
Arial, Calibri, Helvetica. Clean, universally installed, no rendering surprises. Calibri is the Microsoft Word default — most-used, safest bet. Helvetica renders slightly wider than Arial and reads better on Mac. Pick one and stick with it.
Serif (best for print-inspired feel)
Georgia, Times New Roman. Georgia looks more modern; Times New Roman looks more traditional. Both parse perfectly. Serif is fine for lawyer / academic / finance-adjacent roles where a traditional feel signals seriousness.
Fonts to avoid
Cambria Math, Segoe Script, Century Gothic, Comic Sans, any downloaded Google Font, any custom brand font. When the ATS can't render your font it substitutes a default — silently breaking your line breaks, spacing, and sometimes character encoding. Never worth the aesthetic gain.
Font sizes that parse cleanly
Body text: **10.5 to 11pt**. Below 10pt the recruiter squints and skips; above 12pt for body wastes page space. Headings: **12 to 14pt**. Your name at the top: **16 to 22pt** — larger than any other text on the page so the parser locates it as the primary identity string.
Never use size to shrink a resume to one page. If you're forced below 10pt to fit, you have a content problem, not a format problem. Cut older bullets or use a second page instead.
Margins
The safe range is **0.7 to 1 inch** on all sides (top, bottom, left, right). Below 0.6 inch pushes text to the edge of the page and makes recruiters skim; above 1 inch feels sparse and signals a thin resume.
The 0.7-0.8 range is optimal for 2-page resumes. The 0.9-1.0 range is optimal for 1-page resumes with more white space. If you're using different margins on different sides (e.g., narrower right/left, wider top/bottom), keep the difference under 0.2 inch or the resume looks visually off.
Layout — one column, always
This is the single most-broken thing on modern resumes. ATS parsers read left-to-right, top-to-bottom, one line at a time. In a two-column layout, the parser stitches columns row-by-row — so a left-column job title ends up glued to a right-column skill, and neither field is filed correctly. Your 8 years of experience get dumped into an 'other' bucket the recruiter never sees.
One-column, left-aligned, full-width. Boring. Effective. Save multi-column designs for your portfolio site or a version you print for in-person interviews. The version you upload to a job board must be one column.
Line spacing and paragraph spacing
Line spacing: **1.15 to 1.3**. Tighter than 1.0 looks like a wall of text and recruiters skim. Looser than 1.5 wastes page real estate and signals sparse content.
Space between paragraphs / bullet groups: **6-10 points** (roughly one blank line at 11pt body). Between major sections (Experience → Education): **12-16 points**. Visible sectioning helps both the parser and the human eye find where one section ends and the next begins.
Headers, footers, page numbers
**Never put contact information (name, email, phone) in a Word/PDF header or footer.** Most ATS platforms ignore these entirely — your entire contact block disappears. Put your name, email, and phone in the top of the main body of the first page as plain text.
Page numbers are fine (bottom center or bottom right, 9-10pt, muted color). But keep them out of the top-of-page header where the parser might interpret them as your name.
The quick self-check
Before submitting, copy the text out of your PDF or DOCX. Paste into a plain-text editor (Notepad, TextEdit, or a browser text field). If what you paste is jumbled — columns interleaved, bullet points out of order, contact info missing — that's what the ATS sees. Fix the formatting before uploading.
For a numeric check, paste the resume into ResumeChecker (free, no signup, ~30 seconds). If your score is below 65 the issue is likely formatting-level. Above 80 means the format is clean and any remaining gaps are content-level (keywords, section coverage).