CV Examples: CV vs Resume in the US, With Samples

In the US, a resume is a short, targeted summary of your work for one job, and a CV (curriculum vitae) is a complete record of your academic and professional history. Most US employers want a resume. You need a CV mainly for faculty jobs, graduate school, fellowships and grants, university research roles, and academic medicine. When an employer outside the US asks for a "CV," it usually means something closer to a US resume.

Below you will find a quick table for deciding which one to send, a full sample CV outline, and the same sample person's resume so you can see exactly what changes between the two.

Which one should you send? A quick decision table

The job posting is your best signal. If it says "CV" and the employer is a university, research institute, or academic medical center, send a CV. If a US company outside academia asks for a "CV," it most often means a resume. When in doubt, ask the recruiter or send a resume.

The federal rule deserves a second look because it is strict. OPM's applicant guidance says job seekers must choose a resume of two pages or less to apply through USAJOBS. A long academic CV will not work there, even for a scientist applying to a federal lab, so build a two-page resume version.

What actually differs between a CV and a resume

The University of Illinois career center puts the difference simply: a resume summarizes your skills and experiences for a particular position, while a CV is a more comprehensive document used mostly in academic settings. Everything else follows from that difference in purpose.

One habit from MIT's guidance is worth copying: keep a "master" CV with everything you have ever done, then make a tailored version for each opportunity. Even a CV gets reordered. For a research-focused role, research experience goes first; for a teaching-focused role, teaching goes first.

When a US job really needs a CV

Academia

MIT lists the main uses of a CV in the US: teaching or research positions, fellowships, further academic training, grants, tenure and promotion, and professional society membership. Illinois adds graduate and professional school applications and notes that ordinary employers rarely ask for one. If you are applying for an adjunct, lecturer, tenure-track, or postdoctoral role, a CV is the expected document.

Research

University and nonprofit research institutes usually want a CV because hiring committees judge your publications, methods, funding, and presentations. A company research team usually wants a resume, even from PhDs. A common middle path is a two-page resume with a "Selected publications" section of two to four items that match the job.

Medicine

Academic medicine runs on CVs, and many medical schools publish their own template. Hofstra's Zucker School of Medicine, for example, organizes faculty CVs into sections such as postdoctoral training, hospital appointments, funded projects, teaching of students and residents, clinical activities, and peer-reviewed publications. If the hospital or school gives you a template, use it exactly. For a nonacademic clinical job, such as a staff role at a private practice, ask whether they want a CV or a resume, since practices differ.

International applications

Outside the US, "CV" is often simply the word for a resume. The UK's National Careers Service says a CV should include contact details, an introduction, education, work history, and references, and it advises leaving out your age, date of birth, nationality, and marital status. In the European Union, many applicants use the Europass CV, an online builder run by the European Commission that lets you create CVs in 31 languages. Check the norms of the specific country before you send anything, and when a posting lists exact sections, follow the posting.

Sample CV outline: an early-career researcher

This is a sample built for a fictional person. Names, schools, and titles are invented. Copy the order and level of detail, then replace every line with your own record.

1. Header: Jordan Rivera, PhD Candidate, Department of Environmental Engineering, [University]. Email, phone, city and state, professional website or ORCID iD.
2. Education: PhD, Environmental Engineering, [University], expected May 2027. Dissertation: "Low-cost sensors for tracking nitrate in rural wells." Advisor: Dr. [Name]. MS and BS listed below it with years.
3. Research experience: Graduate Research Assistant, [Lab name], 2022 to present. Two or three lines on the question, methods, and outcome. Earlier undergraduate research listed the same way.
4. Publications: Peer-reviewed articles first, in reverse chronological order and your field's citation style, with your name in bold. Then manuscripts under review, labeled as such. List only what is actually published, accepted, or under review.
5. Presentations: Title, conference name, city, and month and year. Mark posters versus talks.
6. Grants, fellowships, and awards: Name, funder, amount if that is customary in your field, and year.
7. Teaching experience: Teaching Assistant, [Course number and title], terms taught, number of students, and your role (lab sections, grading, office hours).
8. Mentoring: Undergraduate researchers you supervised, with their projects.
9. Service: Peer review for journals, department committees, outreach events.
10. Professional memberships: Societies in your field.
11. Skills: Lab methods, software, programming languages, field equipment, languages.
12. References: Three names with titles and contact details, if the posting asks for them. Many academic applications collect letters separately.

Notice what is missing: no objective, no photo, no hobbies, and no list of soft skills. The record speaks for itself.

The same person as a resume

Now suppose Jordan applies for an environmental data analyst role at a consulting firm. The CV would bury the most relevant evidence under publications and teaching. Here is the sample resume version, kept to one page:

• Header: Name, email, phone, city and state, LinkedIn.
• Summary (two lines): "Environmental engineer finishing a PhD, with five years of water-quality field sampling and Python data analysis. Built a sensor dataset now used by two county health departments." (A detail like the county use would have to be true and checkable.)
• Skills: Python (pandas), R, GIS, field sampling, QA/QC, technical writing.
• Experience: Graduate Research Assistant, 2022 to present, with three bullets focused on results a client would care about: data volume handled, a tool built, and who used the findings.
• Selected publications and presentations: Two items that match the job, not the full list.
• Education: PhD (expected), MS, BS, one line each.

For help writing those result-focused bullets, see our guide on how to write a resume. If you are unsure whether to lead with experience or skills, the resume format guide compares the three common layouts.

Turning a CV into a resume in six steps

1. Pick one target job. Print the posting and highlight the required skills.
2. Start a new file. Editing your CV down tends to leave academic leftovers.
3. Write three to five bullets per relevant role, each showing an action and a result in the employer's terms.
4. Translate jargon. "Mixed-effects modeling of longitudinal cohort data" might become "statistical modeling of five years of patient data" for a general reader.
5. Use the posting's words where they are true for you, so both people and applicant tracking systems can see the match. Our ATS-friendly resume format guide covers layouts that parse cleanly.
6. Cut to one or two pages, and never more than two for USAJOBS.

Going the other way, from resume to CV, means adding rather than cutting: list every publication, presentation, course taught, and grant, then move research or teaching to the top depending on the job.

Common mistakes and quick fixes

• Sending a nine-page CV to a company. Fix: build a one- or two-page resume and add a "Selected publications" line if it helps.
• Sending a resume to a faculty search. Fix: committees want the full record. Use a CV and a cover letter written for academic readers. Our cover letter examples show how to match a letter to its reader.
• Padding a short CV. Fix: a student CV can be two pages. Do not list coursework as "research" or turn a poster into a talk.
• Adding a photo or date of birth for a US job. Fix: leave them off. US resumes and CVs do not include them, and UK guidance advises against a date of birth too.
• Listing submitted papers as published. Fix: label status honestly as published, accepted, or under review.
• Ignoring an institution's template. Fix: if a medical school, university, or grant program supplies a format, it overrides general advice, including this page.

One last check before you send either document: read the posting again and ask which document would make this reader's job easier. If they are judging a career of scholarship, that is a CV. If they are judging fit for one role, that is a resume.