Updated September 13, 2021 | Ben Hastil
Does your resume need an update? Or are you creating a resume for the first time? Sometimes, all you need is your favorite word processor, enough time, and a great resume guide. Other times, a resume template can help you highlight your strengths, better organize your experiences, and make you stand out in a way that increases your chances of catching the hiring manager’s eye.
Below, we review four sites that provide excellent resume templates, one of which might even help you land your dream job!
ResumeSeed
ResumeSeed offers 25+ premium resume templates for download as Microsoft Word documents.
Key features of their templates:
- They use text box-style elements to format their templates, so it’s easy to tweak the template (to change text, colors, fonts, or sizes) or even make more significant changes (such as to its layout) to fit your specific needs.
- Their templates come with fully-formatted options for one, two, and (in some cases) three page resumes.
- Most of ResumeSeed’s templates aren’t free, but we are happy to be able to provide a coupon (TODAY20) for 20% off their templates!
ResumeCompanion
ResumeCompanion offers 37 free resume templates for download as Microsoft Word documents, divided into “Modern” templates, “Professional” templates, “Basic & Simple” templates, “Creative” templates, and “Career & Life Situation” templates.
Key features of their templates:
- They use text box-style elements to format their templates, so it’s easy to tweak the template (text, colors, sizes, layout, etc.) or even make more significant changes to it (with the caveat below) to fit your specific needs.
- Their templates only provide a one-page layout, but most can be modified to provide additional blank pages for resumes that are longer than one page.
- A couple functional resume templates are offered (see in their “Career & Life Situation” templates), in addition to the traditional chronological resume templates.
- A lot of their templates make use of blocks of solid colors for styling, which may bleed through when printed, and be better to avoid.
ResumeGenius
ResumeGenius offers 38 free resume templates for download as Microsoft Word documents, divided into “Modern” templates, “Professional” templates, “Creative” templates, “Basic and Simple” templates, and “Career and Life Situation” templates.
Key features:
- They use text box-style elements to format their templates, so it’s easy to tweak the template (text, colors, sizes, layout, etc.) or even make more significant changes to it (with the caveat below) to fit your specific needs.
- Their templates only provide a one-page layout and cannot be easily modified to provide additional blank pages to allow for resumes that are longer than one page in length.
- They offer a wide variety of resume layouts (with full page and column-style options).
- One functional resume template (see the “Career and Life Situation” templates) is offered, in addition to the traditional chronological resume templates.
- Their templates require installing the fonts used in the resume template, or they won’t display correctly (the fonts are provided, along with installation instructions).
ResumGO
ResumGO offers over 260 free resume templates for download as Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint, or Apple Pages documents, or for access as Google Slides documents, divided into “Clean” templates, “Simple and Professional” templates, “Elegant” templates, “Modern” templates, “Creative” templates, “1-Column” templates, and “2-Column” templates.
Key features:
- They use text box-style elements to format their templates, so it’s easy to tweak the template (text, colors, sizes, layout, etc.) or even make more significant changes to it (with the caveat below) to fit your specific needs.
- Their templates only provide a one-page layout and cannot be easily modified to provide additional blank pages to allow for resumes that are longer than one page in length.
- They offer a wide variety of resume layouts (with full page and column-style options).
- They offer Microsoft PowerPoint, Apple Pages, and Google Slides options for their resume templates, in addition to the standard Microsoft Word option (though see below).
- The Google Slides option didn’t work well for us, with the format making it difficult to customize the template with our own resume details without breaking the layout of the template, unfortunately.
- Some of their templates include a place for a photo, but photos generally shouldn’t be included in a resume. As this article points out, it’s unnecessary and it can be used to discriminate.
Summary
All of the sites above offer great options for resume templates. If you need a template with fully-formatted options for a resume that is two or three pages in length, though, ResumeSeed is your best option.
Have a question about the resume templates that we didn’t answer above, or had success with a specific resume template? Let us know! Know someone who would find these resume templates helpful? Share it with them via the options below!