What's a good ATS score?
On LaunchCV, 80 or higher is a good score: we call that band “ready to send.” 65–79 is “readable” — your resume will parse, but it's losing points somewhere. Below 65 is “at risk”: enough checks are failing that real information is likely getting lost or ignored.
That's our score, not a number every ATS or every resume checker agrees on — see the next section. What it means in practice: a score in the 80s means the five checks below are mostly satisfied; a score in the 50s usually means a missing section, bullets with no results, or formatting a parser can trip on.
QUICK FACTS
80+ is ready to send, 65–79 is readable, below 65 is at risk.
- 80+ is LaunchCV's “ready to send” band; 65–79 is “readable”; below 65 is “at risk”
- There's no industry-standard ATS score — Workday, Greenhouse, iCIMS, Taleo, Lever and SuccessFactors each parse resumes with their own software
- LaunchCV's score checks five things: content completeness, impact, writing, ATS format and keywords
- It runs in your browser from rule-based checks — no AI, no upload, no network call
- It estimates parseability and content quality, not your odds of getting an interview
There's no single, universal "ATS score"
"ATS score" is a term resume checkers use, not a number the applicant tracking systems themselves publish or compute. Workday, Greenhouse, iCIMS, Taleo, Lever and SAP SuccessFactors are six different pieces of software, built by six different companies, and each parses a resume with its own rules.
A few examples, from what each vendor documents:
- Workday says parsing results can vary with a resume's format and word order, and its admin guide notes that parsing skips the Skills and Languages sections — you fill those in by hand.
- Greenhouse's resume parser can't handle files over 2.5 MB, and lists graphics, tables, headers and footers among the common causes of a failed parse.
- iCIMS documentation says its parser most often misses content in text boxes, images, annotations and tables, and that a resume with the name only in the header fails to parse.
- Oracle Taleo says a resume uploaded as an image isn't parsed at all, so it never fills the keyword field recruiters search.
- Lever fills a candidate's location field straight from the parsed resume, and lets recruiters search the parsed text directly.
- SAP SuccessFactors says scanned or image-based PDFs "won't parse as expected," while a PDF exported from a text document parses as designed.
Because of that, the same resume can come out looking strong in one system and incomplete in another — and a score from one checker isn't directly comparable to a score from a different one, since they're not necessarily checking the same things. See our guides to each system for the specifics that matter when you apply.
- Workday →What the application form will read.
- Greenhouse →File types, size limits and Quick Apply.
- iCIMS →Upload your resume before anything else.
- Oracle Taleo →Upload, paste or import, then review.
- Lever →A short form, so the resume does the work.
- SAP SuccessFactors →Files that parse, and data that stays.
- Ashby →A resume field recruiters can turn off.
- SmartRecruiters →A portal that signs you in with a code, not a password.
- Jobvite →A short form, unless LinkedIn covers it.
- BambooHR →No built-in parsing, so the form is what gets read.
What our ATS score actually measures
LaunchCV's score runs entirely in your browser — rule-based checks, no AI and no network call — and combines five weighted categories into one 0–100 number:
| Category (weight) | What it checks |
|---|---|
| Content completeness (25) | Contact details, a headline, a 25–120 word summary, at least one job with a title and company, 3+ bullets, education and 6+ skills. |
| Impact (25) | The share of bullets with a number or outcome (60% earns full marks), and bullets that open with a duty phrase instead of an action. |
| Writing (20) | Filler words and clichés, repeated opening verbs, bullets of 8–30 words, one consistent end-punctuation style, and no “I” or “my” in bullets. |
| ATS format (15) | Standard section names, dates written as Mmm YYYY in one style, no tables or columns, a readable email and phone, and a length of about one to two pages. |
| Keywords (15) | The share of a job description's terms your resume uses (80% earns full marks) — only scored once you add a job description. |
Keywords only counts once you add a job description; without one, the other four categories are reweighted to fill the full 100 points. That's why your score can change without you editing a single word of your resume — adding or removing a job description changes what's being measured, not just the result.
What the score does and doesn't tell you
The score estimates two things: how cleanly a parser can read your resume, and how complete and well-written its content is. It is not a prediction of whether you'll get an interview. Employers add their own screening questions, requirements and search terms on top of whatever their applicant tracking system parses, and none of that is something a resume checker can see in advance.
Treat the number as a checklist, not a guarantee: a resume at 85 that's honest and specific is worth more than one pushed to 99 by stuffing in keywords that don't match your real experience.
How to raise your score
Work through these in order — each one maps to a category above:
- Fill in every contact field — full name, email, phone and location — plus a headline and a 25–120 word summary
- Add at least one job with a title, a company and 3–5 bullets, plus education and 6 or more skills
- Rewrite duty-phrase bullets (“Responsible for…”) as an action and a result; aim for a number or outcome in most of them
- Cut filler (“various”, “results-driven”, “utilized”) and vary your opening verbs so bullets don't repeat
- Keep bullets to 8–30 words, pick one end-punctuation style, and drop “I” and “my”
- Use standard headings (Experience, Education, Skills), one column, and Mmm YYYY dates everywhere
- Paste in the job description to score how many of its terms your resume actually uses