How the ATS resume checker scores (and what it cannot do)
The CVPosh ATS checker is a checklist. It starts at 100 and subtracts points when one of the rules below fires. That is all it does: it does not simulate Workday, Greenhouse, Lever or any other employer system, and it cannot predict whether anyone will call you. Use it to catch avoidable problems, not as a verdict.
The rules
| Rule | Points | What it looks at |
|---|---|---|
| Word count under 200 | -20 | Flags a CV that has too little text to judge. |
| Word count over 800 | -10 | Flags a very long CV. |
| No email address found | -15 | Looks for something shaped like name@domain.tld. |
| No phone number found | -5 | Looks for a phone-number shape: 10 digits (555-010-4477), a number starting with + and a country code (+91 98765 43210), an (area code) number such as (11) 91234-5678, or two groups of five digits. |
| Fewer than 3 of 4 section names | -20 | Looks for the words experience, education, skills and summary or profile anywhere in the text. |
| Fewer than 5 bullet lines | -10 | Counts lines that start with •, - or * followed by a space. |
| ™, ® or © present | -5 | These characters sometimes break plain-text parsing. |
| Tab characters present | -10 | Tabs usually mean a table or columns were pasted in. |
| Readability (Flesch) below 30 | -5 | Each line is treated as one sentence, then the Flesch reading-ease formula is applied. |
Checks that only produce a tip and never change the score:
- No https:// link found: shown as a tip, no points lost.
- No action verb from a short list found: shown as a tip, no points lost.
- No number, percentage or dollar amount found: shown as a tip, no points lost.
The score is clamped between 0 and 100.
Worked example (made-up person, real code)
Both texts below were run through the same function the tool uses. The names, company and numbers are invented.
Version 1: 65 / 100
Ada Example ada@example.com Experience Data Analyst, Acme Corp, 2021 - Present Responsible for weekly reports and dashboards. Worked with the sales team on data requests. Education BSc Statistics, Example University, 2018 Skills Excel, SQL
Flagged: under 200 words (-20), no phone number (-5), fewer than 5 bullet lines (-10). Tips only: no link, no action verb from the list, no numbers.
Version 2: 80 / 100
Ada Example ada@example.com | 555-010-4477 | https://www.linkedin.com/in/ada-example Summary Data analyst with four years of reporting experience in retail. Experience Data Analyst, Acme Corp, 2021 - Present - Built and maintained 12 weekly SQL dashboards used by the sales team - Reduced monthly reporting time from 2 days to 3 hours by automating the pipeline in Python - Led a clean-up of customer data that removed 18% duplicate records ...
(Excerpt shown; the tested text continues with three more bullet lines, then education and skills sections.) Phone, link, summary, six bullet lines, action verbs and numbers are present. The one deduction left is the word count: this sample is only 116 words, so it still trips the under-200 rule. A real CV with more content would not.
What the score cannot tell you: whether the bullets are true, whether they are the right ones for the job, or whether a human will find them convincing.
The keyword analyzer on the same example
The keyword analyzer compares a CV with a job description. For this job description:
We are hiring a Data Analyst. You will build SQL dashboards, automate reporting in Python, and present findings to stakeholders. Experience with Tableau and data analysis is required.
- Version 1 matches 47% of the extracted terms. Missing: build, automate, python, findings, stakeholders, tableau, analysis, data analysis.
- Version 2 matches 87%. Missing: build (the CV says “built”; irregular forms are not matched) and findings.
Matching is by word stem, not meaning, and the percentage is just matched terms divided by extracted terms. Add a keyword only if it truthfully describes work you did.
Questions
Does the CVPosh ATS checker tell me whether an employer system will accept my resume?
No. It applies a fixed checklist (length, contact details, section names, bullets, odd characters, readability) to the text you give it. Employers use many different systems with different rules, and none of them are visible to us.
Is a higher score better?
Only in the sense that fewer checklist items were flagged. The score has no proven link to interviews or hiring outcomes.
Is my resume stored when I use the checker?
The file or text is sent to our server to be analyzed and is not saved in our database. It is plain code with no AI vendor involved. See the privacy policy.
How does the keyword analyzer match words?
It takes the 50 most frequent non-filler words and a few phrases from the job description and checks whether the same words (compared by stem) appear in your resume. It does not understand synonyms, and irregular forms such as build and built are not matched.
Run the checker (free, no account) or start a CV in the builder.