Making a CV online in 2025
The way people make CVs has changed. A decade ago, you'd open a Word document, struggle with formatting for an hour, save it as a PDF, and hope for the best. The results were inconsistent: the formatting broke on different computers, the file disappeared in recruiters' inboxes, and updating it was a chore.
Today, you can make a professional CV online in minutes, formatted correctly for both humans and ATS systems. This guide covers everything — structure, content, formatting, and distribution.
CV vs resume: a quick note for Indian job seekers
In India, "CV" and "resume" are used interchangeably in everyday conversation, but they technically refer to different documents. A resume is 1–2 pages, tailored for each application. A CV (curriculum vitae) is comprehensive — it includes your full academic history, publications, certifications, and everything else, and can be 4–10 pages for academic or research positions.
For most corporate job applications in India — IT, consulting, finance, marketing, product — you want a resume, not a full CV. When this guide says "CV," it means a 1–2 page professional resume formatted for corporate applications.
The structure of an effective Indian CV
Indian hiring managers and ATS systems expect a specific structure. Deviating from it without a good reason works against you.
Contact Information (top of page)<br>Full name, city and state, phone number, email, LinkedIn URL. For portfolio website URL — see below. Do not include a photo, date of birth, or marital status for applications to modern companies. (Government and some PSU applications may still require these.)
Professional Summary (3–4 sentences)<br>Your current role, years of experience, specific skills, and what you're looking for. Use keywords from your target job descriptions. This section is read by humans when your resume survives ATS filtering — make it specific and compelling.
Work Experience (reverse chronological)<br>Company name | Job Title | Location | Date range. 3–5 bullet points per role, starting with action verbs, including quantified results wherever possible. Use past tense for previous roles, present tense for current role.
Education<br>Degree, institution, year of graduation, CGPA/percentage. For experience professionals with 5+ years, education goes after experience. For freshers, education can go first.
Skills<br>Technical skills, software, languages, certifications. Separate technical from soft skills. Use exact tool names.
Projects (optional but recommended)<br>Especially relevant for engineering, data science, and design roles. Project name, tech stack, one sentence on what it does or achieved.
Certifications (if relevant)<br>Platform, certification name, year. AWS certifications, Google certifications, CFA levels, PMP — include these. Online courses from Coursera or Udemy are lower credibility and can be included briefly or omitted.
Writing bullet points that actually land
Most CV bullet points are weak because they describe responsibilities rather than achievements. The difference:
Responsibility: "Responsible for managing the social media accounts for the brand."<br> Achievement: "Grew Instagram following from 12K to 85K in 8 months through short-form video content strategy, driving a 34% increase in inbound leads."
Not every bullet point can be quantified — some work doesn't produce measurable numbers. But every bullet point should be specific. "Managed" with no detail is empty. "Managed the migration of 40TB of legacy data to AWS S3 with zero downtime" is specific.
How to format your CV to pass ATS
The ATS formatting rules are simple:
- Single column only — no two-column layouts
- No tables, graphics, or images
- Standard section headings (Experience, Education, Skills — not creative variations)
- Standard fonts (Arial, Calibri, Times New Roman)
- Contact info in body text, not in headers/footers
- Save as PDF (not image-based PDF)
Test your CV by copying the text into Notepad. If it reads clearly and is in the right order, it will parse correctly in most ATS systems.
Making your CV online: the fastest method
If you have an existing resume or LinkedIn profile, notapdf generates both a portfolio website and an ATS resume from it. The process:
- Upload your current PDF resume to notapdf.com/generate
- Select your field
- Preview the portfolio and the ATS resume (both generated from your source material)
- Publish for ₹599 — you get both outputs, permanently
The ATS resume comes as clean HTML you can open in any browser and print to PDF. It's formatted for Naukri, LinkedIn Apply, and Workday parsers.
Where to include your portfolio website URL in your CV
Add your portfolio URL to your contact section at the top of your CV. Format: notapdf.com/yourname. Place it after your LinkedIn URL.
When a recruiter reads your CV and clicks the portfolio link, they go from a text document to a full professional website. That transition builds credibility. They've moved from reading about you to experiencing how you present yourself.
Updating and maintaining your CV
Keep a "master CV" document with every role, project, and achievement. When applying, trim this to the most relevant content for the specific job. Never send the same CV to every job without reviewing it — the effort of tailoring keywords and emphasis to each application significantly improves your shortlist rate.