Should I include a photo on my resume for Indian jobs?

No. Most modern Indian employers, especially in IT, consulting, finance, and startups, prefer resumes without photographs. Including a photo can introduce unconscious bias and is discouraged by companies with structured hiring processes. The only exceptions are certain hospitality, airline, or modeling roles that explicitly request a photograph.

Should I include personal details like date of birth, marital status, or father's name?

No. These details were standard on Indian resumes a decade ago but are no longer expected or recommended. Modern hiring practices in India have moved away from personal details that are irrelevant to job performance. Stick to your name, phone number, email, city, and LinkedIn profile.

What is the ideal resume length for Indian jobs?

One page for freshers and candidates with less than 5 years of experience. Two pages maximum for experienced professionals with 5 to 15+ years of experience. Indian recruiters reviewing applications on Naukri or through campus placements appreciate concise, well-structured resumes.

Do I need to include a declaration or signature on my Indian resume?

No. The traditional declaration statement ('I hereby declare that the above information is true to the best of my knowledge') and signature block are outdated. They waste space and add no value. Employers verify information through background checks, not resume declarations.

Should I format my resume differently for Naukri vs LinkedIn?

For Naukri, upload a well-formatted PDF or Word document and also fill in the profile fields completely, as many recruiters search using Naukri's database filters rather than downloading resumes. For LinkedIn, your profile serves as your resume, so keep the uploaded document consistent with your profile. In both cases, use a clean, ATS-friendly format.

Indian Resume Format: How to Write a Resume for Jobs in India (2026 Guide)

Published January 30, 2026

The Indian job market has its own conventions, expectations, and quirks when it comes to resumes. Whether you are a fresher applying through campus placements, an experienced professional updating your Naukri profile, or someone targeting MNCs operating in Bangalore, Mumbai, or Hyderabad, understanding the Indian resume format is essential to getting shortlisted.

This guide covers everything you need to know about writing a resume specifically for the Indian job market in 2026, including structure, sections, what to include, what to leave out, and how to optimize for both recruiters and Applicant Tracking Systems.

How Indian Resume Expectations Have Changed

If you graduated before 2015, you probably learned to write a resume that included a photograph, your date of birth, father's name, marital status, a "declaration" at the bottom, and possibly your permanent address. That format is completely outdated.

Indian hiring practices have modernized significantly. Large IT companies like TCS, Infosys, Wipro, and HCLTech now use Applicant Tracking Systems. Startups in Bangalore and Gurgaon follow Silicon Valley hiring norms. MNCs operating in India apply the same resume standards they use globally. The result is that the modern Indian resume looks much more like its international counterpart than the traditional format many colleges still teach.

If you are unfamiliar with how ATS software works and why formatting matters, read our guide to writing ATS-friendly resumes before continuing.

The Recommended Indian Resume Structure

1. Contact information

Place this at the top of your resume. Include:

Full name (as it appears on official documents)
Phone number (with country code +91 if applying to MNCs)
Professional email address (use Gmail or Outlook, not college email IDs that expire)
City and state (e.g., "Pune, Maharashtra" — full postal address is not needed)
LinkedIn profile URL
Portfolio or GitHub link (if relevant to your field)

Leave out: photograph, date of birth, gender, marital status, father's name, nationality, religion, passport number, and full postal address. None of these are relevant to your ability to do the job, and including them signals that your resume follows an outdated format.

2. Professional summary

Write 3 to 4 lines summarizing your experience level, domain expertise, key skills, and what you are looking for. This section is critical because it is the first thing both ATS software and recruiters scan.

Example for experienced professional: "Java Backend Developer with 6 years of experience building scalable microservices for fintech applications. Currently at Paytm, leading a team of 4 engineers responsible for the payments reconciliation system processing 2M+ daily transactions. Proficient in Java, Spring Boot, Kafka, and AWS. Seeking a Senior Engineer role at a product-driven company."

Example for fresher: "B.Tech Electronics and Communication graduate from NIT Trichy (2026) with a strong foundation in embedded systems and IoT. Completed a 6-month internship at Bosch India working on automotive sensor firmware. Proficient in C, C++, Python, and MATLAB. Seeking a full-time embedded systems engineering role."

For more examples, see our article on resume summary examples for every career level.

3. Work experience

List your work experience in reverse chronological order (most recent first). For each role, include:

Job title
Company name, city
Duration (Month Year - Month Year or "Present")
3 to 6 bullet points describing achievements and responsibilities

Start each bullet with a strong action verb and quantify wherever possible. Indian recruiters, just like their global counterparts, are drawn to specific numbers: revenue impact, percentage improvements, team size, users served, and project timelines.

Good bullet: "Reduced API response latency by 40% by implementing Redis caching, improving user experience for 500K+ daily active users."

Weak bullet: "Worked on improving backend performance."

4. Education

For experienced professionals (3+ years), education comes after work experience. For freshers, education moves up to become a prominent section.

Include:

Degree and specialization (e.g., B.Tech in Computer Science)
Institution name and city
Graduation year
CGPA or percentage (include if above 7.0/10 or 70%)

For freshers, also include relevant coursework, academic projects, and academic achievements. You can include 10th and 12th board results if you are a very recent graduate and the scores are strong, but drop these once you have any professional experience.

5. Skills

Organize skills by category. This helps both ATS parsing and recruiter scanning. For guidance on structuring this section, see our detailed guide on how to list skills on a resume.

6. Projects (especially important for freshers)

If you are a fresher or have limited work experience, projects are your most powerful section. Include academic projects, personal projects, hackathon entries, and open-source contributions. For each project, describe what you built, the technologies used, and the outcome. Our fresher resume format guide covers this in depth.

7. Certifications

Online certifications from NPTEL, Coursera, Udemy, Google, AWS, and Microsoft carry weight in the Indian job market, especially when combined with projects that demonstrate applied knowledge. List the certification name, issuing organization, and completion date.

Fresher vs Experienced Resume: Key Differences

The core structure is the same, but the emphasis shifts:

Fresher resume (0-2 years):

Education section appears before work experience
Projects section is prominent and detailed
Internships are treated as work experience
Certifications and extracurriculars fill out the page
One page maximum

Experienced resume (3+ years):

Work experience leads the resume
Education is brief (degree, institution, year)
Projects section is optional or replaced by portfolio links
Focus is on career progression and measurable impact
One to two pages

Optimizing Your Resume for Naukri and Indian Job Portals

Naukri.com remains the dominant job portal in India, and how you present yourself there matters. Here are specific tips:

Complete your Naukri profile fully. Many recruiters search Naukri's database using filters (skills, location, experience, salary) rather than downloading resumes. Your profile fields need to be filled in accurately.
Use a keyword-rich headline. Your Naukri profile headline is searchable. Instead of "Looking for opportunities," write "Java Developer | Spring Boot | Microservices | 4 Years Experience."
Upload a clean PDF resume. While Naukri has its own profile format, recruiters often download the attached resume. Make sure it is a clean, ATS-friendly PDF.
Update regularly. Naukri's algorithm favors recently updated profiles. Update your profile every 2 to 4 weeks during an active job search, even if only to edit a small detail.
Set the right current and expected CTC. Indian recruiters filter heavily by salary expectations. Be realistic and research market rates for your role and experience level.

For LinkedIn, keep your profile and uploaded resume consistent. Discrepancies between the two can raise red flags during screening. Our article on resume keywords for ATS covers keyword strategy that works for both portals and ATS systems.

What to Remove From Your Indian Resume

If your resume contains any of the following, remove them immediately:

Photograph: Not needed and potentially introduces bias
Date of birth / age: Irrelevant to job performance
Father's name: An outdated convention with no professional relevance
Marital status: Personal information that does not belong on a resume
Complete postal address: City and state are sufficient
Declaration and signature: Wastes space and adds no value
Generic objective statements: "Seeking a challenging position to utilize my skills" helps no one. Write a specific professional summary instead
References ("available on request"): This is assumed. Do not waste a line on it
Hobbies like "listening to music" or "watching cricket": Unless a hobby is directly relevant to the role, leave it off

Indian Resume Format: Common Mistakes

Beyond the outdated elements above, watch out for these frequent mistakes on Indian resumes:

Using a college-provided template from 2010. Many Indian engineering colleges distribute resume templates that include every outdated field. Use a modern template instead.
Writing in third person. "He has worked at TCS for 3 years" reads oddly. Write in implied first person without pronouns: "Worked at TCS for 3 years leading a QA team of 5."
Listing every technology ever encountered. Claiming 25 programming languages when you are a fresher undermines credibility. List only skills you can discuss confidently in an interview.
Not quantifying achievements. Indian resumes tend to describe responsibilities rather than impact. Always try to include numbers: revenue, percentages, users, timeline, team size.
Sending the same resume everywhere. Tailor your resume for each application. The resume you send to Flipkart should emphasize different things than the one you send to KPMG.

For a comprehensive list, see our article on 15 common resume mistakes that get your application rejected.

Build Your Indian Resume Now

The Indian job market is competitive. Whether you are applying through campus placements, Naukri, LinkedIn, or company career pages, a well-formatted, modern resume gives you a significant advantage over candidates still using outdated formats.

EasyResume's free builder creates clean, ATS-compatible resumes that follow modern Indian and global standards. No photo fields, no declaration blocks, no outdated formatting. Just a professional resume that gets you shortlisted.