How Far Back Should a Resume Go?

How many years of experience should you list on your resume?

You generally shouldn’t put more than 15 years of work experience entries on your resume, even if you’re making a resume as an older worker.

However, that doesn’t apply to everyone. For instance, are you applying for a managerial or executive role? Such positions require a lot of experience, and a longer resume with more experience listed is acceptable for such applications.

Here’s how to determine how much work experience you should include in your own resume:

How far back your resume should go based on your background

Here’s how far back a resume should go for people at different stages in their careers:

For most people: 10–15 years

If your career path so far has been typical (for example, you’ve stayed in one industry and haven’t had substantial career gaps), then you can list between 10 and 15 years of experience on your resume.

Why you should avoid going back over 15 years

1. Your resume should be concise. Employers prefer reading a one-page resume that highlights your most relevant experience rather than a lengthy account of your entire life (that’s actually what a CV is for). Setting a 10–15-year limit on your resume helps keep your resume both short and relevant.

1. Limiting your work experience to 15 years allows you to better avoid disclosing your age. Age discrimination is a real thing, and has the potential to affect anyone at some point in their lives. Removing job experience older than 15 years can help avoid drawing attention to your age as an older job seeker.

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For people with job-relevant experience earlier in their career: 15+ years

If you’re applying for jobs that require skills you haven’t used in a long time, you may go back even further than 15 years to include those skills on your resume.

For example, if you’re proficient in COBOL but haven’t used it since the early 90’s, you can include it in your resume’s work experience section even though it was over 15 years ago.

To fit all of your relevant experience onto your resume, consider using a two-page resume so that employers don’t miss anything.

For people with sizable career gaps: 15+ years

Have a long gap in your resume from the time you were working your last stable job? In this case, it’s fine to add work experience dating from before 15 years ago.

You can use your resume summary to set out your reasons for your career gap. Alternatively, explain it when you write your cover letter.

Employers are sympathetic to career gaps if you:

• took a break to care for a newborn child
• were busy upskilling or attending grad school
• needed to care for a relative
• were doing something productive or meaningful like volunteering

For people who’ve worked at prestigious workplaces or had impressive job titles: 15+ years

Some companies and job titles are more impressive than others. Worked at the White House? That experience is going to raise your profile over other candidates for a role, so put it down even if it was over 15 years ago.

Similarly, if you’ve ever worked for a big-name company like Microsoft or Apple, it’s worth putting their names down too because they command a lot of respect among hiring managers.

Additionally, an impactful job title is worth adding to your resume. For example, if you’ve ever been a Chief Technology Officer, it can provide a glimpse of how capable you are, so you can add it.

New graduates: As much as you have

As a recent graduate, you might have little experience even if you’ve held down part-time jobs while studying, so feel free to include all the experience you do have.

That experience may include:

1. work experience (including part-time jobs and internships)
2. volunteer work
3. extracurricular activities
4. relevant coursework
5. sorority or fraternity work

If you’re adding these experiences to your resume, format them like you would a previous job. Add a job title, organization name and location, dates worked there, and some resume bullet points clarifying your achievements with hard numbers.

Career changers: 5 years

Changing industries? Your resume should stick to more recent work experience unless you have relevant experience from your earlier days as a professional. For example, if you’re applying for a managerial role in your new field, go into detail about your managerial experience.

However, as it’s likely you’ll have little or no relevant experience in your new industry, there’s no reason to include all of your work experience in your current field.

Instead, focus on the last five years so that you:

1. seem fresh to the job market
2. focus on your transferable skills from previous roles to the industry you’re interested in joining
3. keep your resume short

IT professionals: 5 years

If you work in the IT industry, you don’t need to go back as far as 10–15 years on your resume.

We suggest focusing on the last 5 years of your career because IT skills and tools quickly become outdated, so the experience you want to list from 10 years ago won’t reflect the tools you currently use.

Instead, use the space you’ve saved to create an extra technical skills section that you can use to list even more of the programs, apps, and skills you’ve mastered.

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Federal employees: your entire career

If you’re a federal employee or currently applying for government jobs, you’ll be expected to detail the entirety of your career to hiring managers.

While it might seem like a lot of work, this requirement is easier than you might think. Instead of creating a resume from scratch, a federal resume is a standardized document that you can download a template for and fill in (although you still have to spend some time thinking of impressive resume accomplishments, skills, and hard numbers to include).

You can even use the US government’s federal resume builder to quickly create a resume for a federal job.

Academics/researchers: your entire career (on a CV)

If you work in academia or are a researcher, you’ll need to write an academic CV instead of a resume.

A CV’s length depends on the breadth of your career, but is generally much longer than a resume because it includes all of your:

• publications
• conferences
• group projects
• research grants
• teaching experience
• professional appointments
• awards

So there are many examples of CVs that are over 10+ pages long.

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Frequently asked questions

These are some of the most common questions job seekers have about how far back a resume should go:

How many jobs should be on a resume?

You should include from two to five jobs on your resume. While the number of jobs you add depends on your experience level, a range of two to five makes sure you have enough substance in your application for hiring managers while also keeping your resume focused.

How far back should a resume go for education?

Go no further than your highest level of education on your resume when writing your education section. If you’re worried your graduation date is too long ago and might lead to age discrimination, leave it off your resume.

How far back should volunteer experience on a resume go?

If your volunteer experience is one of your top examples of relevant experience, include it on your resume even if it’s been 10+ years since you held the position. If your volunteer experience isn’t relevant to the position, you shouldn’t include it.