Resume vs CV: What Is the Difference?

What is the difference between a resume and a CV?

In the North American sense, a resume is a short, selective summary of your experience, written for one job. A CV, short for curriculum vitae (Latin for "course of life"), is a complete record of an academic or professional career, and it grows every year.

Do different countries use different words?

So a British job posting asking for a CV wants the same thing an American posting calls a resume: a focused document of about two pages. An American university asking for a CV wants the full academic record.

What goes on an academic CV?

• Contact details and current position.
• Education, including dissertation title and advisors.
• Academic appointments.
• Publications, in your field's citation style, split into peer-reviewed articles, books, chapters and work under review.
• Grants, fellowships and awards, with amounts where usual.
• Teaching experience, with courses and levels.
• Conference presentations and invited talks.
• Service: committees, reviewing and editorial work.
• Research skills, languages and professional memberships.

The order depends on the institution. Research universities want publications and funding near the top; teaching-focused colleges want teaching first. Our academic CV example shows the opening pages.

How is a European or international CV different?

Outside the English-speaking countries, CVs often include personal details that American and British applications leave out: a photo, date of birth, nationality, and sometimes marital status or military service. Expectations vary a lot by country and are changing, so check local advice and recent job postings.

• Germany: a tabular Lebenslauf, often with a professional photo, although employers may not require one.
• France: one to two pages, a photo still common in some sectors.
• Turkey and much of the Middle East: a photo and date of birth are common, and military service status is often asked of men.
• The Europass CV, created by the European Union, gives a standard format that is accepted across the EU, though many employers prefer a regular CV.

The builder has optional fields for these details, such as date of birth, nationality, military service and work permit, and leaves them off unless you add them.

How do you turn a CV into a resume?

Academics moving into industry often need to shrink a long CV into a one or two page resume. The key is to translate research into results an employer needs.

1. Start from the job posting and list what it needs.
2. Describe your research as projects: the question, the methods and tools, and the outcome.
3. Replace the full publication list with one line: "Author of eight peer-reviewed articles", plus one or two that are relevant.
4. Turn teaching into skills: presenting, explaining complex ideas, managing groups.
5. Keep it to two pages at most, with a summary at the top.

When do you need a CV in the United States?

• Faculty, research and postdoctoral positions at universities and institutes.
• Graduate school, fellowship and grant applications.
• Physician, dentist and many other clinical positions in academic medicine, where publications and training history matter.
• Some scientific, policy and international organization roles that ask for one by name.

If a US posting asks for a "resume/CV", it almost always means a resume. When in doubt, look at what the posting wants to know: if it asks for publications and teaching, send the CV.

Can a resume and a CV use the same design?

Yes. The difference is content and length, not design. A calm, one-column layout with clear headings suits both, and it keeps long lists of publications or projects easy to scan. Templates made for academic CVs, such as those in the academic family on our templates page, leave extra room for citations and dates.

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