How Many Bullet Points Per Job on a Resume

This is probably one of the most frequently asked questions about resumes. There are over 1,500 people every month asking this question. While there are some good suggestions out there on the internet, I’d like to take a more sophisticated approach to this today.

For starters, anyone who says there is a hard and fast rule about how many bullet points you should use per job on a resume is wrong. Resumes just don’t work that way.

So to unpack this question (and answer), I’d like to start with the following:

First, should you even use bullet points on your resume?

Should each job have the same number of bullet points?

A breakdown of how many bullet points per job by different scenarios.

How many bullet points are too many?

What about sub-bullet points? Yes, I get asked that a lot.

Some tips on how to write resume bullet points.

Some tools I think you should use to help you create bullet points.

And finally, I’ll wrap up with an example resume. Because who doesn’t love examples!

Ready to unpack this thing? Let’s go.

Should You Use Bullet Points on Your Resume

Yes, you should use bullet points on your resume. But no, I don’t think you should only use bullet points in your job experiences.

Many resume writers advocate for a straight-bullet point resume. In other words, you list each company, the job, the dates of employment, and a list of bullet points. And I get the logic behind it. It’s easier to read bullet points. It improves readability, it’s concise, and it requires fewer brain calories for the reader to digest when compared to lengthy paragraphs.

But I think you sacrifice something more important when you write this way. Logic and structure. The way you write is just as important as what you write. It would be hard to show up to an interview 10 minutes late and then try and make the case that you’re the most punctual person on the planet.

Similarly, it’s hard to say that you can communicate logically and that your thoughts are organized when you write with random ordered bullet points that remind me of my grocery list. And no, my grocery list isn’t organized by produce or meats. It’s random. There is no logic, no structure, and no organization.

Instead, I would propose this. Write an opening introduction to each job. In this intro you should tell the hiring team the following:

• How you got the job

• Why you were hired for that job

• Connect the dots between the company and your target companies (revenue size, industry, etc)

• What you were responsible (with context)

Then use your bullet points as evidence to back up your introduction. Use those bullet points to show that you are good at what you said you were responsible for.

Here’s an example.

If you need more help writing job experiences, start with my free resume writing guide. It’s detailed with formulas and is the best place to start learning how to write like this.

Should Each Job Have the Same Number of Bullet Points

Absolutely not. This is one of my biggest frustrations with resume certification courses and the writers that come out of some of these programs. While it looks uniform and pretty to have the same number of bullet points, people don’t interview other people because of pretty resumes (unless you’re a graphic designer perhaps). They interview people when they read words that make them want to interview you. Period.

So what does that mean for the number of bullet points per job on your resume?

First, not every job needs bullet points. If you’re working a bridge job right now to make some cash but it has nothing to do with the work you want to do and the work you used to do, why would you list out a bunch of bullet points about it? List it on your resume, write a one-line intro about what you are doing, and move on. Don’t force the reader to get stuck on something that has no relevance to them and your future. Get them past it as quickly as possible.

Another situation that may require a job to have more bullet points than others is when you’ve worked for a company for an extended amount of time. You’re going to have more relevant things to write about if you’ve been doing a job for 5 years vs someone who has been doing it for 1 year.

Also, senior leadership roles typically are more complex and this may require you to have more bullet points.

Last week I wrote a government affairs resume and one job had 14 bullet points. Another one had 2.

Now, if you’re reading this and feeling confused about what to do, don’t worry. In the next section, I’m going to break out as many situations as I can think of and how many bullet points would be a good benchmark so you can apply it to your unique situation.

How Many Bullet Points Should You Use Per Job

If you’re looking for a generic, general benchmark of how many bullet points you should include per job, I tend to agree with most of the literature out there. Three to five bullet points per job are typical of most well-written resumes I’ve seen. However, it is not the rule and in some cases following that benchmark may harm you.

The most important thing to remember about determining the number of bullet points is this. Each item you write should support your unique message, back up your claim that you are good at the job you want next, and have a purpose. Never write something simply to have more bullet points.

If you need more bullet points, use more bullet points. I’ve written some resumes that have 12 bullet points for one job. Just make sure each one is relevant and the hiring team will find value in reading it.

Entry Level Jobs

For most entry-level jobs you’ve held, the average number of bullet points you will use per job will be somewhere between two and five. If it’s a recent, relevant entry-level job, then you may have more. If it’s an entry-level job that is five or more years in the past, you may only have a couple.

If you’re no longer applying for entry-level jobs and you have over five years of non-entry job experience, you may choose to only list one or two bullet points for older entry-level jobs. For older jobs of any kind, you may choose not to have any bullet points. I’ll talk more about that later.

Mid Level Jobs

For most mid-level jobs, four to six bullet points is a good average per job. At this point in your career, you’ve accumulated a bit more experience and you may have some diverse experiences to communicate which require more bullet points.

Remember to focus your bullet point content on what is important for your next job, not the one you hold today. And to do that, you may need a few more than you did for your entry-level experiences.

Management Level Jobs

I work with a lot of managers each year to draft their resumes. The higher up the chain, the more high-stakes it becomes to have the right resume and interview well because there are fewer opportunities. For these jobs, most of the resumes I write have five to six bullet points, but some are closer to ten depending on what level of management we are writing about.

Management resumes typically have more bullet points because there are more relevant things to discuss. You’ll want some bullet points talking about your mentorship ability, some to talk about the execution of initiatives, some about conflict resolution, some about strategic initiatives, and some about hands-on things like reporting. Because there’s often more going on at this level, you will need more bullet points.

Senior Manager Level Jobs

Most senior manager to executive level resumes I’ve seen and written have at least six bullet points per job. Some have up to twelve. Writing about executive-level experience can be very challenging because, at this point in your career, you’ve done a lot of things. And so it’s easy to have a runaway bullet train happen where you look down and realize you have over twenty bullet points for one job.

That’s probably too many. The key here is to figure out what your defining message is. What problem are you known for solving and what are the three to four ways you solve that problem? Then hone your bullet points on items that discuss those things. For senior management resumes, the challenge is not what to write, but what not to write.

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Most Recent Jobs

In most cases, your most recent job should have the most bullet points. It’s the most relevant experience because you’re either doing it still or it was the last thing you did. Employers almost always weigh recent experience as more relevant and more important than past experiences.

There are some exceptions to this. If you haven’t been in your most recent job very long, then it may have fewer bullet points than your next few jobs. In this case, your second job may have the most bullet points.

Another exception would be if your most recent job holds little relevance. I’ll talk more about this next.

Non-Relevant Jobs

Many of us have worked jobs that have little relevance to the hiring team for our “next” job. We may have worked a bridge job just to pay the bills. We may have been sold a job and then found out it wasn’t anything like what it was supposed to be after we started. Whatever the reason, you may have some jobs on your resume that don’t have many relevant talking points.

That’s ok. There is no rule that you even have to list out any bullet points. If it’s completely irrelevant to the job you’re applying for, you may only have a quick line about it and then move the reader on to something more applicable to their needs.

Older Jobs

As I mentioned earlier, older jobs usually carry less weight with hiring teams. What usually happens in many resumes is the number of bullet points per job shrinks as the resume goes farther back in time.

In fact, at a certain point, some resumes only mention the job title and company under a previous experience resume subtitle without any context, dates, or bullet points. That is perfectly acceptable if you’re trying to show that you have more experience, but it’s so far in the past that it’s not relevant to write it out in detail.

Freelancing and Consulting Jobs

Many people group their freelancing and consulting jobs under one job heading and then mention the type of companies they worked with or the number of companies they worked with during that time frame. Because consulting is gig-based and there are often breaks in between gigs, this is often easier than trying to write about each experience separately.

If you’ve had extensive consulting experience with multiple companies and you elect to write this way, it’s possible that you could have five to ten bullet points for this one job. Similarly to my advice for executives, your challenge is going to be a process of omission. Decide on what is the most relevant and impactful and write about those things.

Related Article: Is Freelancing Worth It

Conclusion

Remember, all of these benchmarks are just that. They’re not rules; they’re guidelines to give you an idea of what most resumes look like. That doesn’t mean your resume will look like this. I can’t emphasize enough that what really matters is having a concise narrative and making every bullet point relevant to the hiring team who is reading it. Ultimately, that is how you will determine how many bullet points each job has.

Can You Have Too Many Bullet Points on Your Resume

Yes, you can, but I think this is the wrong question to ask. Rather than asking this question, the better question would be, “Do I have irrelevant bullet points?”

Having irrelevant bullet points is what leads to having too many bullet points per job on your resume. It’s not about the number. If you have twelve bullet points per job, but each one is relevant and drives home your qualifications for a specific job, most hiring teams will read them all.

But when you have bullet points that are off-message and don’t make sense to the hiring team, it confuses people. And if you confuse, you lose.

If every bullet point is written with intention, and it shows a unique important qualification to the hiring team reading it, then I don’t think it’s possible to have too many.

Can You Use Sub-Bullet Points for Jobs on a Resume

I rarely see a resume with sub-bullet points, but I have seen them. These resumes are usually written with only bullet points and I suspect this is an attempt to incorporate structure and logic.

Unfortunately, that’s not what happens. I can’t think of any situation where you should do this. Using sub-bullet points on a resume looks messy and unorganized. This isn’t an outline for your school paper. It’s a succinct communication tool designed to communicate your qualifications for a job. Don’t treat a resume like an outline. Treat it like the finished paper.

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How to Use Resume Bullet Points on Your Resume

You can ignore most of the advice and rules about how to write resume bullet points. Most of them have been created by people who design resume writer certification courses rather than recruiters and people who review resumes for a living. They’re nice best practices, but in reality, they won’t matter much. So don’t lose sleep over things that won’t make a real difference.

What Should I Use Resume Bullet Points For

While there are many ways to write a resume, if you want to write in a similar style to my own, you will use resume bullet points to communicate a couple of things.

• Evidence that you are good at your job (especially the parts that are relevant to the job you want next)

• Evidence of your transferable skills and traits

• Additional context about your job function that makes you unique

This means that your bullet points should include metrics. It could be a context-based metric such as processing 1,000 invoices per month. It could be an achievement-based metric such as “Saved $10,000 by flagging a duplicative invoice.”

Don’t forget to check out my Definitive Guide on Resume Writing which talks about this in more detail.

Where Should I Put Resume Bullet Points And How Do I Structure Them

For job experiences, I prefer to add bullet points under a subheading titled “Key Contributions,” “Achievements,” or something similar. Take a look at my Boeing example from earlier in this article and you’ll see this in action.

There’s no one right way to structure bullet points. Some people say to lead with the result, others will say to lead with a powerful action verb and include the result last. Here’s the truth from multiple recruiters - it doesn’t matter. Just be sure you have all the elements in each bullet point and try to keep it consistent. If you’re going to lead with results, then it’s best to lead with results in every bullet point.

Below is a formula from my free resume guide that you can use.

How Long Should Each Bullet Point Be

Try to keep each bullet point to two lines max if you can, but don’t be afraid to take up more space if you need to. I have seen and written some bullet points that go on for three lines because that’s what is required to communicate the thought.

If someone tells you that it’s a rule to keep each bullet point to one line or even two lines of text, you can ignore that. Rules are meant to be broken sometimes. However, you don’t want a bunch of long-winded, lengthy bullet points that look like a paragraph either.

Bullet points are meant to be brief and I could argue that if you’re repeatedly going over two lines of text, you’re probably not writing as concisely as you could be. Make sure each bullet point is relevant, concise, clear, and the necessary facts are there. You don’t have to include every detail of what happened, just the important details. It’s not a story about what you did, it’s a story about how you’re qualified.

Resume Bullet Point Best Practices

1. Use your bullet points to provide evidence that shows you are good at the key skills and experiences the job is asking you to have.

2. Use metrics whenever possible. Don’t lie, but an estimate is different than a guess. Use estimates.

3. Be specific. Don’t waste bullet points on vague statements that could belong to anyone. Each bullet point should uniquely belong to you and discuss something specific.

4. Keep it simple. You don’t need to include every granular detail about how something was done. You just need someone to read it and want to ask you more about it.

5. It doesn’t matter what order you build a bullet point in as long as you make sure it has a result and relevant contributing factor.

6. Action verbs are good to use, but don’t get too ostentatious. It won’t help you.

7. Use a resume bullet point generator to help you brainstorm and obtain ideas for your bullet points. I’ll reference some in the next section that I trust.

8. Have a reason and purpose for writing each bullet point. If you can’t answer the question, “why would the hiring team want to read this?” then you may want to spend more time thinking about what you’ve written.

Tools That Can Help You Write Effective Bullet Points

With the rapid acceleration of AI, many resume bullet point generators have come onto the market in the past few years. I’ve tested and used about 30 of them and many of them are rubbish. However, I have found some good ones.

Here is a list of my favorite resume bullet point generators that use AI.

Best for Achievements - Teal

Best For Context - Hiration

Best Well Rounded - Rezi

Resume Bullet Point Example

And this article wouldn’t be complete without an example of some great resume bullet points. Here’s an example resume with some great bullet points.

How Many Bullet Points Per Job on Resume Recommended Reading

The Best Resume Bullet Point Generators (Reviewed)

Best AI Resume Builder

Ideal Resume Word Count (How Long Should It Be)

Resume Writing: The Definitive Guide

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Cole Sperry has been a recruiter and resume writer since 2015, working with tens of thousands of job seekers, and hundreds of employers. Today Cole runs a boutique advisory firm consulting with dozens of recruiting firms, oversees Optim’s Resume Revision Service and On-Demand Coaching Program, and is the Managing Editor at OptimCareers.com.