Resume Headings: The Section Names an ATS Reads Correctly

The resume headings screening software reads correctly are the plain ones: Summary, Experience (or Work Experience), Education, Skills and Certifications, plus optional sections such as Projects, Volunteer Experience, Awards and Languages. An applicant tracking system finds your sections by recognizing words like these, so a creative heading can file your work history in the wrong place or lose it. Type each heading as ordinary text in the body of the page, on a line of its own, never inside a text box or the document's header.

How an ATS uses your section headings

A parser does not read your resume the way a person does. Textkernel, a resume-parsing vendor, describes the first step in its developer documentation: "One of the first things the Parser does is split the resume into sections. Each section is then handed to a sub-parser that knows how to handle the type of information in each section." The same page lists the section types it knows, among them WORK_HISTORY, EDUCATION, SKILLS, CERTIFICATIONS, LICENSES, SUMMARY, OBJECTIVE, LANGUAGES, TRAINING, PROFESSIONAL_AFFILIATIONS, MILITARY and SECURITY_CLEARANCES.

That list is the practical rule. Every heading on your resume should map obviously onto one of those buckets. "Experience" maps to work history. "Places I've Made a Difference" maps to nothing, so the parser has to guess where your jobs start, and when it guesses wrong the recruiter opens your profile and finds the employment fields empty or scrambled.

Greenhouse, an applicant tracking system, is just as plain in its support article on failed parses. Its list of causes includes "Complex resumes with tables, headers, and footers", "Resumes with the name and contact information in the header, footer, or text box", "Resumes that have a columned layout" and "Resumes without clear sections and differing formats throughout each section". Standard headings, styled the same way every time, are how you give the parser clear sections.

Resume header vs resume headings

Search for "resume headings" and half the results are about the resume header: the block at the top with your name and contact details. It needs no heading of its own, and it should never say "Resume" or "Contact Information". Write your name, the job title you are targeting, city and state, phone, email and one link as normal text at the top of the page body. Do not put it in the Word header area, which is the exact case Greenhouse lists. The step-by-step resume guide covers what goes in it and what to leave out.

The standard resume headings, and the variants that parse

Use the first column unless you have a reason not to. The second column is safe too, because each variant keeps the word the parser keys on. The third column is where resumes go wrong.

Section	Use this	Also safe	Avoid
Summary	Summary	Professional Summary, Profile, Summary of Qualifications	About Me, My Story, Who I Am
Objective	Objective	Career Objective	My Goals, What I'm Looking For
Work history	Experience	Work Experience, Professional Experience, Employment History, Work History, Relevant Experience	Where I've Been, The Story So Far, Career Highlights
Education	Education	Education and Training, Academic Background	Learning, Where I Studied
Skills	Skills	Technical Skills, Core Skills, Key Skills, Core Competencies	Toolbox, Superpowers, What I Bring
Certifications	Certifications	Licenses and Certifications, Certifications and Training	Badges, Credentials Wall
Projects	Projects	Selected Projects, Academic Projects	Things I've Built, Side Quests
Volunteering	Volunteer Experience	Volunteering, Community Involvement	Giving Back
Awards	Awards	Honors and Awards	Wins, Brag Sheet
Languages	Languages	Language Skills	Lingo, Fluent In
Publications	Publications	Publications and Presentations	My Writing
Memberships	Professional Affiliations	Professional Memberships, Associations	Clubs I'm In
Military	Military Service	Military Experience	Serving My Country
Training	Training	Professional Development, Relevant Coursework	Always Learning
Interests	Interests	Hobbies and Interests	Life Outside Work

"Work Experience" and "Professional Experience" are equally safe. Pick "Work Experience" if you also have a Volunteer Experience section, so the two read as a pair.

Optional sections: what to call them and when to include them

The core four (Summary, Experience, Education, Skills) belong on almost every resume. Everything else has to earn its space by helping this particular application.

• Projects. For students, developers, designers and career changers whose best evidence is not a job. Write each entry like a job: name, your role, the date, one or two results.
• Certifications. Any credential the posting asks for, or that your field expects. The format for each line is in the guide to listing certifications on a resume.
• Volunteer Experience. Its own section below Experience. If the volunteer work was substantial and close to the target job, it can sit inside Experience instead, with "(Volunteer)" after the title.
• Awards. Graduates can list scholarships and dean's list. Professionals should keep only awards judged by someone outside their own team.
• Languages. Each language with a real level: native, fluent, working, basic, or a CEFR level such as B2.
• Publications. Researchers, consultants, clinicians and anyone whose field counts them.
• Professional Affiliations. Memberships the reader will recognize, such as a state bar or a nursing association. Skip the ones you only pay dues to.
• Military Service and Security Clearance. For veterans and government contracting. For a clearance, state the level and whether it is active.
• Interests. One line, and only when it says something relevant or the market you apply in expects it.

Section order by career stage

The rule behind every row: the section that best proves you can do this job goes directly after the summary. The order below is the default when nothing overrides it.

Career stage	Order after the header	Why
Student or recent graduate	Objective or Summary, Education, Experience, Projects, Skills	The degree is your strongest evidence, so it comes first.
One to ten years of experience	Summary, Experience, Skills, Education, Certifications	Your work history now carries the argument.
Senior, ten years or more	Summary, Experience, Skills, Certifications, Education	Education shrinks to one line at the bottom.
Career changer	Summary, Relevant Experience or Projects, Skills, Certifications or Training, Other Experience, Education	Evidence for the new field goes above the old job titles.
Licensed profession (nurse, teacher, electrician, CPA)	Summary, Licenses and Certifications, Experience, Education, Skills	The license is a legal requirement for the job, and the reader checks it first.

For a career changer, splitting work history into "Relevant Experience" and "Other Experience" is fine. Both headings keep the word Experience, so both still read as work history.

Here is the full set of headings for a typical mid-career resume, in order, exactly as they would appear on the page:

1. SUMMARY
2. EXPERIENCE
3. SKILLS
4. CERTIFICATIONS
5. EDUCATION
6. LANGUAGES

Six headings, all single words or close to it. Nothing about them is memorable, and they are not supposed to be. The reader should notice what sits under them.

Headings to avoid, and why they fail

• Creative names. "Where I've Been", "My Toolbox", "The Highlights Reel". A person can work out what they mean. A parser matching against a fixed list of section types may not.
• Headings inside text boxes or shapes. Many downloadable Word and Canva templates place headings, and sometimes whole sections, in floating text boxes. Greenhouse lists contact details in a text box as a cause of failed parses, and a heading in a box has the same problem: it sits outside the normal reading order of the page.
• Anything in the header or footer zone. The Word header is for page numbers. Your name, your contact details and your section headings all belong in the body.
• Spaced-out letters. "E X P E R I E N C E" looks like a heading and reads as ten one-letter words. Greenhouse names this one explicitly: the parser "won't recognize the separate letters as a single word". If you want wide letter spacing, set it with character spacing in the font settings, not with the space bar.
• Icons instead of words. A briefcase icon with no word beside it is invisible to software. Keep the word, and treat the icon as decoration.
• Headings in a sidebar column. Two-column templates often put Skills and Education in a narrow side column. Columned layouts are on Greenhouse's list of parse problems. Keep one column and put Skills in the main flow of the page.
• Catch-all sections. "Other", "Miscellaneous" and "Additional Information" tell neither the parser nor the recruiter what is inside. Give the content a real heading or cut it.

How to format headings so they read as headings

• Give every heading the same style: one size, one weight, one case. Consistency is how both software and a person tell a section heading from a bold job title.
• Put the heading on its own line with nothing after it. No dates, no summary text, no colon.
• Title Case and ALL CAPS both work. Pick one and use it everywhere.
• A thin line under each heading is fine if it is a paragraph border. A line drawn as a shape is a graphic, and graphics are on the same Greenhouse list.
• Keep headings to one to three words.

The page on what makes a resume template ATS-friendly covers the rest of the layout: columns, fonts, tables and file type.

FAQ

What are the main headings on a resume?

Summary, Experience, Education and Skills, plus Certifications if you hold any that matter for the job. The contact block at the top does not need a heading. Everything else, such as Projects, Languages or Volunteer Experience, is optional.

Should I use "Work Experience" or "Professional Experience"?

Either. Both contain "Experience", which is the word that identifies the section. "Work Experience" pairs naturally with a Volunteer Experience section; otherwise it is a matter of taste.

Can I use creative resume headings to stand out?

Not in the headings. A recruiter scanning the page looks for Experience to find your last job, and a clever name slows that down. Make the bullets memorable and let the headings disappear.

Should resume headings be in all caps?

All caps and title case parse the same way. Choose one, apply it to every heading, and make headings slightly larger or bolder than the body text.

Is "Objective" still a valid resume heading?

Yes. Textkernel's parser, for one, has an OBJECTIVE section type. Whether you should have an objective at all is a separate question, answered in the guide to resume objective examples.

If you would rather not fight a Word template over any of this, the free resume builder puts your content on an ATS-friendly template for you. The plain single-column Basic template downloads as a clean PDF at no cost, and you do not need an account.