Software Engineer CV: UK Template & 10+ Examples

Whether you’re already a great software engineer or you’re on your way to becoming one, having what it takes isn’t your biggest challenge.

How many recruiters or hiring managers have you met that know how to pronounce C#?

Your software engineer CV has to be detailed enough to impress a CTO or fellow engineer—

And clear enough for HR and management to grasp.

This guide will show you: 

• A software engineer CV example better than 9 out of 10 of those out there.
• How to write a software engineer CV that will land you more interviews.
• Tips and examples of how to put skills and achievements on a software engineer CV.
• How to describe your experience on a CV for a software engineer to get any job you want.

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Sample CV made with our builder—See more CV examples templates and create your CV here.

Looking for a deeper dive into CV writing? Need more CV examples or some free templates? Check out some of our related posts:

• Engineering CV Sample
• Web Developer CV Sample
• Computer Science CV Sample
• IT CV Sample
• Data Analyst CV Sample
• Project Manager CV Sample
• Video Editor CV Sample
• Software Developer CV Sample
• Graduate CV Sample
• Internship CV Sample
• Best CV Samples for Other Jobs

Software Engineer CV template

Now here’s how to write your best CV for software engineer jobs, step by step:

1. Structure your software engineer CV template the right way

There’s coding in a way that the text editor or IDE doesn’t throw errors, and then there’s adhering to best practices. Both will compile just fine, but it’s the elegant and well-commented code that earns respect. It’s similar with software engineer CVs.

Get your CV format right and make sure your CV follows a tried and tested template. Use the reverse-chronological CV format. This means including a clear header with your contact details, a CV summary or objective, a work experience section, education section, skills list, and two or three additional CV sections.

Give each section a clear heading. Make it stand out by using a larger, bold font and surrounding it with plenty of white space. Use 1.15 line spacing and leave all four margins at 1 inch.

Choose a professional CV font. Calibri or Arial is a safer bet than using one of your weird terminal or IDE mono fonts.

Once you’re done, save your software engineer CV in whatever format they require in the job advert. Go with PDF if they don’t declare a preference. PDF is more stable than something like *.docx, it’ll display more reliably on a wide range of devices.

Here’s an important strategy too few people know about: don’t try to write the first part of your software engineer CV—the CV summary or objective—first. That’s a great way to hit the wall before you even begin.

Instead, start with the backbone of your CV: your work experience. 

Read more: How to Start a CV: Guide with Examples

2. Start by bootstrapping your software engineer CV work experience section

Nothing inspires hiring managers’ confidence in your ability to do the job like evidence of you having done it before, and done it well. Past behaviour predicts future behaviour, and employers know this.

That’s why your work experience section is the most critical. Here’s how you can make yours punch well above its weight, whether you have a lot of experience, a little, or even none at all.

Start by creating a subheading for each of your previous positions. Use the job title, your employer’s name, and the dates you worked there. Put “present” in place of an end date for your current job.

Put these job descriptions in reverse-chronological order: from most recent to least. Add up to six bullet points under each subheading. Fill these bullet points with your most impressive and relevant achievements.

An achievement is the description of tasks you performed at work and the benefits that went to your employer as a result. An achievement is always going to be more impressive than a duty or responsibility. If you’ve already got a list of responsibilities in your CV, you can turn them into achievements.

Start each achievement with a strong verb, like “created”, “developed” or “implemented”. Describe a concrete task or project. Quantify the value you brought to your employer if you can. You might need to estimate, just keep it realistic and be ready to justify your estimates.

If you can’t put numbers to the benefits that went to your employer, focus on the scale on which you did something or the frequency with which you did it. For example, “wrote 50+ automation scripts” or “ran weekly training sessions for junior software engineers”.

Let’s see some more software engineer CV examples: 

Software engineer CV examples UK: Work experience

Same candidate, same experience, very different impressions.

The second example is full of classic duties and responsibilities—you can see for yourself how effective it is compared to the first one. It’s not bad, not by a long shot. It’s just not good enough to beat out all the other candidates.

What if you don’t have the work experience to pull this off?

You can still write a CV work experience section that’ll beat out other graduate software engineer CVs out there. Focus on any volunteer or internship work you’ve done, as well as relevant achievements from other jobs.

When making a CV in our builder, drag & drop bullet points, skills, and auto-fill the boring stuff. Spell check? Check. Start building a professional CV template here for free.

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When you’re done, Zety’s CV builder will score your CV and tell you exactly how to make it better.

3. Load up your education (It’s even more important than you think!)

There aren’t many self-taught software engineers out there, if any at all. Education is critical in this line of work. Getting it right in your software engineer CV isn’t as much of a no-brainer as some people think.

List your qualifications in reverse-chronological order. For each qualification, include the name of the qualification, the awarding institution, and the dates you studied there. Include an expected graduation date if you’re still studying.

Add only your university degrees if you have a year or more of work experience. If you’re just starting out with little or no experience, include your secondary education as well.

For a graduate software engineer CV, add bullet points that cover relevant coursework and projects, your specialisation or favourite fields of study, and any relevant academic achievements and extracurricular activities.

Graduate software engineer CV example: Education

Read more: CV Education Section: Examples & Guide

4. Grep for relevant software engineer CV skills

Achievements trump long lists of skills any day of the week. Achievements show your skills in action in concrete situations and backed up by numbers. Listing skills directly seems like a shortcut to the same end, right?

The problem is anyone can come up with an amazing-sounding list of skills, and hiring managers know this. There’s a way to make them sit up and pay attention, though. You need a short, highly focused list of skills that speaks to the job requirements and is backed up by your experience.

First, create a master list of software engineer CV skills. In a separate document, brainstorm all the skills you can think of. Include both hard skills and soft skills in your master list. Check out the lists below for some inspiration. Save your master list and update it regularly as your skills develop. 

Software engineer CV skills

Hard skills

• Operating systems (Unix-like, MacOS, and Windows)
• Clean code
• Testing
• Project management
• Troubleshooting
• Data analysis
• Technical writing
• Software development
• Statistics
• Agile workflow

Soft skills

• Problem-solving
• Analytical thinking
• Collaboration
• Teamwork
• Time management
• Written communication skills
• Oral communication
• Decision-making
• Organisation
• Deductive reasoning

Now go back to the job advert and pick out all the skills-based requirements. Copy across 5–10 skills from your master list that fulfil these requirements.

If there are a lot of programming languages or software suites and tools in the requirements, it might be better to just create separate sections for those and focus on more general skills here. 

Skills in software engineer CV sample

You’ll need to do this for each new job application—that’s why creating that master list is such a good time investment. Make sure your 5–10 chosen skills match the job advert even more clearly by matching the wording. If they’re looking for “teamwork skills” but you’ve got “team player”, change it to match.

Finally, go back through your work experience section and make sure your achievements back up your skills. Add, reword, or replace achievements as needed.

Read more: Most In-Demand IT Skills to Put on Your CV

5. Increase the resolution of your software engineer CV—Add “extra” sections

Take 30 software engineer CVs all submitted for the same position—especially if it’s an entry-level position—and look at only the work experience, education, and skills sections. Chances are, you’d be hard-pressed to differentiate between them in any meaningful way.

Stand out from the crowd by adding two or three extra CV sections that really put a finer point on why you’re the one they’re looking for. The only rule here is that everything you add has to be directly relevant to the job application at hand.

Add sections with industry certifications, professional affiliations, conferences, programming languages, and software. For a fresh graduate software engineer CV, volunteer work, academic achievements, and even hobbies and interests are fair game.

Software engineer CV sample—Extra sections

 Read more: How to Put Foreign Languages on a CV

6. Compile the most impressive bits into a CV objective or summary

It’s time to go back to the beginning of your software engineer CV and write a CV summary or objective. Much like compiling code, all the hack work is behind you and this most complex stage can be done basically on autopilot.

Got more than a year’s relevant experience? A CV summary is what you need. Search through your CV for two or three particularly impressive achievements. Stick to work achievements unless you have something relevant, recent, and very impressive in your education section.

Come up with an adjective that describes you as a software engineer. Something like creative, dedicated, or hard-working. Think about what it is that you want to achieve for the employer. Look at the job advert and the company’s website for inspiration.

You now have all the ingredients you require. Here’s the formula for putting them together:

Adjective + Job Title + Years of Experience + Achievements and/or Skills + What You Want to Do for the Employer

What if you don't have two or three work-related achievements in your CV? Then a CV objective is for you. Use the formula above, but lean on achievements from your studies, any internship and volunteer work you’ve done, and even vac work. Don’t have enough of those? Put the focus on your skills.

These software engineer CV examples will give you a better idea of how this formula works in real life:

Software engineer CV examples—CV summary

Read more: What Makes a Good CV? Career Experts Explain 

7. Write a software engineer cover letter

Make sure your potential new employer knows what you’re sending them and why. More than that, make them want to read your CV. A good software engineer cover letter shows your enthusiasm and passion and gives them a cross-section of what benefits they can expect when hiring you.

You might hear that many employers don’t even look at cover letters. And here’s the thing: that’s 100% true. But many do read cover letters, and you never know which HR person or hiring manager does and which doesn’t.

Send a cover letter nobody reads, nothing happens. Fail to include a cover letter when they were expecting one and it’s game over. The only way you can be sure they don’t need to see a cover letter from you is if they’ve explicitly asked you not to include one.

Read more: How to Write a Cover Letter for Job Applications

Plus, a great cover letter that matches your CV will give you an advantage over other candidates. You can write it in our cover letter builder here. Here's what it may look like:

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See more cover letter templates and start writing.

Key takeaways

Here’s how to write a software engineer CV, step by step:

• Do your work experience justice by packing it full of achievements.
• Treat your education like it matters, because it really does.
• Filter for the right skills to add to each software engineer CV you send.
• Leverage additional CV sections to set yourself apart from the crowd.
• Compress the best parts of your software engineer CV into a CV summary or objective.

That’s all there is to it! Now you’re off mute:

• What part of writing a software engineer CV did you find most challenging? 

• What advice do you have for fellow software engineers writing their first CV?

Let me know. We can’t wait to see what you have to share!

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Sources

• https://doi.org/10.1002/bdm.1889
• https://www.canyons.edu/_resources/documents/studentservices/career/templates/AchievementStatements-HE.pdf
• https://nationalcareers.service.gov.uk/job-profiles/software-developer