Resume Keywords by Role
Resume keywords are the skills, tools, credentials and job-specific terms that employers use to describe a role. Recruiters search applicant tracking systems for them, and readers scan for them. The best keywords for your resume are the ones in the job description that you can back up with real experience.
Each guide below lists the hard skills, soft skills, action verbs and metrics that job descriptions for that role commonly ask for, with before-and-after bullet examples and the mistakes to avoid. Use them as a checklist against a real posting, not as a list to copy.
Updated · How to use them: finding keywords in a job description
Engineering
Software Engineer resume keywords
Java, Python, Go (Golang), Data structures and algorithms, Object-oriented programming (OOP), Time and space complexity (Big O)
Frontend Developer resume keywords
JavaScript (ES6+), TypeScript, HTML5, React, Next.js, Vue.js
Backend Developer resume keywords
Java with Spring Boot, Python with Django or FastAPI, Node.js with Express or NestJS, RESTful API design, GraphQL, gRPC and Protocol Buffers
Full-Stack Developer resume keywords
React, TypeScript, Next.js, Node.js, Express.js, Python (Django, Flask)
DevOps Engineer resume keywords
Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform (GCP), Terraform, AWS CloudFormation, Pulumi
QA Engineer resume keywords
Test plans and test cases, Regression testing, Exploratory testing, Selenium WebDriver, Cypress, Playwright
Cybersecurity Analyst resume keywords
Security information and event management (SIEM), Splunk, Microsoft Sentinel, Vulnerability scanning, Tenable Nessus, Qualys
Data & AI
Data Analyst resume keywords
SQL, Joins, CTEs and window functions, Python (pandas), Tableau, Microsoft Power BI, DAX
Data Scientist resume keywords
Linear and logistic regression, Bayesian statistics, Hypothesis testing, scikit-learn, XGBoost, LightGBM
Machine Learning Engineer resume keywords
PyTorch, TensorFlow, Keras, Large language models (LLMs), Fine-tuning (LoRA, QLoRA), Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG)
Product & Design
Product Manager resume keywords
Product strategy, Product discovery, Customer interviews, Product roadmap, Product requirements document (PRD), User stories and acceptance criteria
UX Designer resume keywords
User research, Usability testing (moderated and unmoderated), User interviews, Wireframing, Interactive prototyping, Information architecture (IA)
Business & Finance
Business Analyst resume keywords
Requirements elicitation, Business requirements document (BRD), Functional specifications, Business process modeling, Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN), Current-state and future-state (as-is / to-be) analysis
Financial Analyst resume keywords
Financial planning and analysis (FP&A), Annual operating plan (AOP), Budgeting, Three-statement financial modeling, Discounted cash flow (DCF), Comparable company analysis (comps)
Accountant resume keywords
Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), Revenue recognition (ASC 606), Month-end and year-end close, General ledger (GL), Journal entries
Marketing & Sales
Digital Marketing Manager resume keywords
Search engine optimization (SEO), Search engine marketing (SEM), Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, Google Analytics 4 (GA4), Google Tag Manager (GTM), Multi-touch attribution
Account Executive resume keywords
MEDDIC / MEDDPICC, Challenger Sale, SPIN Selling, Pipeline generation, Outbound prospecting, Lead qualification (BANT)
Customer Success Manager resume keywords
Gross revenue retention (GRR), Net revenue retention (NRR), Renewals management, Customer onboarding, Implementation planning, Product adoption