At the job post · 6 min read
What should go in the skills section of a CV?
Which skills belong in a CV skills section, how many to list, how to spell them the way the post does, and how to prove each one elsewhere on the page.
The short answer
Your CV skills section should list the specific, checkable skills the job asks for that you genuinely have: tools, methods, languages, licences and techniques, spelled the way the job post spells them. Keep it to about six to twelve items, grouped if it helps. Leave out soft traits like 'hard-working', and make sure every listed skill is backed by a line in your experience.
Key takeaways
- List hard, checkable skills; prove soft ones in your experience instead.
- Use the post's spelling, so a search for its terms finds yours.
- Six to twelve skills is enough for most roles.
- Every skill listed should appear in a bullet somewhere else on the page.
- Reorder the list for each post, most relevant first.
On this pageWhat counts as a skill for this section?
What counts as a skill for this section?
| Put in the skills section | Show in your experience instead |
|---|---|
| Excel (pivot tables, XLOOKUP) | Attention to detail |
| Salesforce, HubSpot | Relationship building |
| Contract drafting, legal research | Problem solving |
| Python, SQL | Analytical thinking |
| First aid certificate, driving licence | Reliability |
| French (fluent) | Teamwork |
The left column is checkable: a person could ask you to show it. The right column is a trait, and only becomes believable when a bullet shows it happening.
Use the post's spelling
Recruiters and the systems they use often search for the exact terms in the post. If the post says 'Microsoft Excel' and 'stakeholder management', and your CV says 'spreadsheets' and 'working with teams', a search may miss you even though you have both. Spell the skill the way the post does, as long as it's true.
Back every skill up
A skill that appears only in the list is a claim. A skill that also appears in a bullet is evidence. For each item, find the bullet that shows it in use. If there isn't one, either add a true one from your experience, or ask whether it belongs on this CV at all.
Illustrative example: a skills list says 'Tableau'. No bullet mentions dashboards. The fix is one line under the right role: 'Built a weekly Tableau dashboard of returns by store, used in Monday stand-ups'. Now the skill has a place, a use and an audience.
How to lay it out
- Plain text in one column, with commas or short lines, not tables or icons.
- Group into two or three headings if the list is long: Tools, Methods, Languages.
- Put the skills this post asks for first.
- Add level in words only where it matters, such as languages.
Common mistakes
- A list of personality traits instead of skills.
- Every tool you've ever opened, including ones you couldn't use today.
- Star or bar ratings that a parser can't read and a recruiter can't trust.
- Skills the post asks for that you don't have, added to get past a filter.
OffLadder CV, our free Chrome extension, runs an ATS check on the exact file you'll download: one column and real text, standard headings, email and phone in the page itself, a date on every role, bullets of one or two lines, no symbols or filler phrases, the post's own terms, and the page count.
What happens to the gaps
Applying shows you what employers want that you can't show yet: a must-have your CV doesn't mention, or a question you couldn't answer well. Hand the job from OffLadder CV to Laddie, our AI coach, and it turns each one into three steps:
- Learn the skill: a short lesson on what the post asks for, starting from the basics.
- Try the work: a 15-minute task taken from the job itself, so you have a real example to talk about.
- Practise the interview: a five-question mock interview for that role, weighted to the parts you're least sure of.
The conversation stays in your OffLadder account. Once you've done the work, add it to your CV in your own words, and the next post you tailor for can point to it.
Questions people ask
- Should I put soft skills on my CV?
- Not as a list. 'Excellent communicator' is claimed by almost everyone and proves nothing. Show it in a bullet instead: 'Presented the monthly numbers to a team of 30' says communication with evidence. Keep the skills section for things a person could test you on.
- Should I rate my skills with stars or bars?
- No. Ratings mean nothing without a scale, they invite questions you can't win ('only three stars in Excel?'), and graphics can be dropped or garbled by applicant tracking systems. If level matters, say it in words: 'Spanish (conversational)', 'Python (data cleaning, pandas)'.
- Where should the skills section go?
- Usually after the summary and before experience if the role is skill-heavy, such as technical or analyst roles, or after experience for most others. For a career change, a skills section near the top helps the reader see transferable skills before older job titles.
- Can I list a skill I'm still learning?
- Yes, if you say so honestly and can talk about what you've done with it: 'SQL (learning: joins and aggregations on public datasets)'. Don't list it as if you used it at work. An interviewer will ask.
- How many skills should I list?
- Six to twelve covers most roles. Long lists dilute the ones that matter and make the section look padded. If you have more, group them under two or three headings and cut anything the post doesn't ask for.
Exercises are practice, not evidence of career fit or a qualification. How to read our guides and report a correction.
Sources
- How to write a CV · National Careers Service (England)
- Write a successful job application · Prospects (Jisc), UK graduate careers service
How this page is written
Sources support the factual background, not a guarantee that an exercise predicts career fit. Fictional practice material is labelled. Dates record content updates; no independent expert review is implied. More about OffLadder.