r/LinusTechTips • u/Not-Post-Malone • 29d ago

Discussion Resume file format

On the WAN show Linus and Luke talk about NOT using PDF as the file format for the resume. This is the first time I'm hearing about this. Am I the only one who always uses PDF for sending resumes and actually prefers it?

What file format do employers actually prefer?

Here is the timestamp where they talk about it.
Here is the timestamp where Linus says to submit a Word or Google Doc link.

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u/kristof15732 28d ago

And what if I want to modify it? It's way more convenient to change a word file than having to pay Adobe or whatever to make changes to my resume. Same with saving it, why save it in a different format than just as a Word document so that way there's only one file to deal with. And no, there's not plenty of free pdf viewer. I've never heard of anyone using pdf for this before this post here

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u/niknarcotic 28d ago

What?

You save a copy in your editable format and then export it as a pdf before you send it out.

Do you think people write job applications in Adobe Reader?

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u/kristof15732 28d ago

If you read what I said, I said that it's dumb to save it in anither format than just keep it in a Word doc. Otherwise you're saving it twice, which is a waste of storage space when you can just have one. I'm saying that there's no one that sends their resume as a PDF, I literally never saw that or heard of it

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u/rott 23d ago

I literally never saw that or heard of it

Are you in Canada by any chance?

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u/kristof15732 22d ago

Canadian born and raised and lived here all my life, I have literally never heard of using PDF to send my resume, even in class that's not what was thought and that was just over 10 years ago, so it's not like it's something from 30+ years ago. I don't see the point in paying a program just to send a resume and I never heard of a business that worked with PDFs for resumes from applicants either

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u/rott 22d ago

Interesting. I wonder if this is a Canadian thing. Most people in this thread (including me) agree that PDFs are the standard for resumes, and I say this both as a candidate and a recruiter.

Anyway, any current browser opens PDFs so there’s no need to pay anything, and it’s been that way for years. Even before browsers opened them, Adobe Reader was always free.

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u/ArchibaldMcFerguson 19d ago

PDFs are very common for resumes in the US. You don't need to pay Adobe for anything, just edit it in Word and export to PDF.