# Software engineer CV example and résumé tips > A complete software engineer CV example, plus the skills, keywords and bullet points that get engineering CVs past screening and into interviews. Updated 2026-10-07 by Litjob. Web version: https://getlitjob.com/cv-examples/software-engineer Engineering hiring managers skim for three things: what you built, how big it was, and what changed because of it. This example shows a mid-level backend-leaning engineer who makes all three obvious in a single page. ## Sample CV The person and companies below are fictional. ### Daniel Okafor, Software Engineer Software engineer with 5 years of experience building backend services and APIs in TypeScript and Go. Comfortable owning features from design to production, and known for making slow systems fast and flaky ones reliable. #### Experience **Software Engineer II, Northbeam Logistics** (Manchester (hybrid)), 2023 to present - Rebuilt the shipment-tracking API in Go, cutting p95 latency from 900 ms to 180 ms for 2 million daily requests. - Designed an event-driven pipeline (Kafka, PostgreSQL) that replaced nightly batch jobs and gave customers live delivery updates. - Introduced contract tests between 6 services, reducing integration incidents by about half over two quarters. - Mentor two junior engineers through weekly pairing and code review. **Software Engineer, Brightpath Learning** (Lagos, Nigeria (remote)), 2021 to 2023 - Built the payments service (Node.js, Stripe and Paystack) that processed subscriptions in 4 currencies. - Moved CI from 25-minute builds to 8 minutes by parallelising tests and caching dependencies. - Shipped an offline-first sync feature that kept lessons available on unstable mobile networks. #### Education - B.Eng. Computer Engineering, University of Benin (2020) #### Skills - Languages: TypeScript, Go, Python, SQL - Backend: Node.js, PostgreSQL, Kafka, Redis, REST, gRPC - Infrastructure: AWS, Docker, Kubernetes, Terraform, GitHub Actions ## Software engineer summary examples **Graduate or junior:** Computer science graduate who has shipped two production web apps during internships and side projects, using React, Node.js and PostgreSQL. Strong fundamentals in data structures and testing, and eager to learn from code review. **Senior:** Senior software engineer with 9 years designing distributed systems for fintech. Led the migration of a monolith to 14 services without downtime, and sets engineering standards for a team of 12. ## Skills for a software engineer CV - Hard skills: A main language you can go deep in (for example TypeScript, Java, Go or Python), API design (REST, GraphQL or gRPC), SQL and at least one database you have tuned, Automated testing (unit, integration, end-to-end), Cloud platforms (AWS, GCP or Azure), Docker and CI/CD pipelines, System design and scalability, Observability: logs, metrics and tracing - Soft skills: Writing clear design documents, Code review that teaches, Breaking big problems into shippable steps, Working with product and design (show these through your bullet points) ## Keywords recruiters and ATS look for software engineer, backend, full stack, microservices, REST API, distributed systems, CI/CD, unit testing, cloud, agile, code review, scalability Compare your CV with a specific job ad using the free CV keyword checker: https://getlitjob.com/cv-keyword-checker ## Bullet points: before and after - Weak: Worked on the backend team. Stronger: Built and own the order service (Node.js, PostgreSQL) that handles 40,000 orders a day. - Weak: Improved performance of the app. Stronger: Cut page load time from 4.2 s to 1.3 s by adding caching and removing N+1 database queries. - Weak: Responsible for testing. Stronger: Raised test coverage from 35% to 80% and added CI checks that block failing builds. - Weak: Helped with the cloud migration. Stronger: Moved 9 services from VMs to Kubernetes, cutting hosting costs by 30%. ## Tips for software engineer CVs ### Lead with impact, then the stack Recruiters read the first few words of each bullet. Start with what you built or changed, and put the technologies at the end or in brackets. ### Match the job’s stack honestly If the posting asks for Go and you have used it, make sure "Go" appears in your skills and in a bullet. Do not list languages you could not discuss in an interview. ### Link to work people can see A GitHub profile, a portfolio or a technical blog is worth more than a long skills list. Pin your two or three best repositories. ### One page until about 8 years in Cut coursework, old internships and generic skills like "Microsoft Office" first. Keep the space for production work. ## Software engineer interview questions ### Tell me about a system you designed. What would you change now? Pick something from your CV, sketch the components, and be honest about one trade-off you would make differently. ### How do you debug a production incident? Walk through a real incident: how you noticed it, narrowed it down with logs or metrics, fixed it and prevented a repeat. ### How do you decide what to test? Show judgement: critical paths and tricky logic get thorough tests; simple glue code gets lighter coverage. ### Describe a disagreement in code review. Show you can argue with data, accept a better idea, and keep the relationship good.