Knowing which skills to put on a resume can be harder than it sounds.
You may have many skills, but that does not mean you should list all of them. A good resume skills section should show the abilities that are most relevant to the job you want.
For example, a marketing manager does not need the same skills as a software developer. A nurse, accountant, sales representative, and project manager will all need different skill sets.
The goal is simple:
Show the employer that you have the skills the job requires.
This guide explains what skills to put on a resume, which hard and soft skills to consider, how many to include, and how to match your skills to a specific job.
Table of Contents
What Skills Should You Put on a Resume?
The best skills to put on your resume are the ones that are:
- Relevant to the job
- Honest
- Useful in your field
- Supported by your experience
- Easy for the employer to understand
Current resume guidance from Indeed recommends looking at the main responsibilities of the role before choosing your skills. It also separates hard skills from softer workplace skills because both can matter depending on the job.
That means there is no single list of “best skills” that works for every resume.
A better question is:
Which skills does this employer need, and which of those skills do I actually have?
Hard Skills vs. Soft Skills
Understanding this difference makes it easier to build your skills section.
Hard Skills
Hard skills are specific abilities that you can learn, train for, or measure.
Examples include:
- Microsoft Excel
- SQL
- Python
- Data analysis
- SEO
- Google Ads
- Project management
- Bookkeeping
- Graphic design
- Salesforce
- HTML
- Financial modeling
- Medical coding
- Inventory management
These skills are often closely connected to a particular job.
Soft Skills
Soft skills are more about how you work and communicate.
Examples include:
- Communication
- Leadership
- Teamwork
- Problem-solving
- Time management
- Adaptability
- Active listening
- Organization
- Collaboration
- Conflict resolution
Soft skills can be useful, but they are often stronger when you show them through your work experience rather than simply listing them.
Current guidance from Coursera and Teal also recommends using the skills section for quick scanning while showing how you used important skills in your actual experience.
100+ Skills to Put on a Resume
Below are examples you can use as a starting point. Do not copy the entire list. Pick the skills that match your experience and target job.
Communication Skills
- Written communication
- Verbal communication
- Active listening
- Presentation skills
- Public speaking
- Business writing
- Client communication
- Email communication
- Report writing
- Negotiation
- Persuasion
- Cross-team communication
Communication is useful in almost every job, but simply writing “good communication skills” is usually weak.
It is better to show what you did with that skill.
For example:
Skills: Client communication
Experience: Managed communication with 50+ business clients and maintained a 95% customer renewal rate.
Leadership Skills
- Team leadership
- People management
- Delegation
- Coaching
- Mentoring
- Decision-making
- Team building
- Performance management
- Strategic planning
- Staff development
- Conflict management
- Change management
Leadership skills can be useful for managers, supervisors, project leaders, and experienced professionals.
But you do not need a management title to have leadership experience.
You may have led a project, trained new employees, managed a client relationship, or taken responsibility for a major task.
Problem-Solving Skills
- Problem-solving
- Critical thinking
- Analytical thinking
- Troubleshooting
- Root-cause analysis
- Decision-making
- Research
- Process improvement
- Risk assessment
- Creative problem-solving
These skills are especially useful when the job involves finding problems and deciding what to do next.
Instead of simply listing “problem-solving,” support it with a work example.
Example:
“Identified a recurring order problem and changed the process, reducing delivery errors by 18%.”
Time Management and Organization Skills
- Time management
- Organization
- Scheduling
- Prioritization
- Deadline management
- Calendar management
- Task management
- Workflow planning
- Resource planning
- Multitasking
- Record keeping
These skills are useful in almost every workplace, especially when you manage several projects or deadlines.
Customer Service Skills
- Customer service
- Customer relationship management
- Complaint handling
- Customer retention
- Client support
- Conflict resolution
- Account management
- Service recovery
- Customer communication
- Customer success
For customer-facing jobs, specific customer service skills are usually more useful than generic phrases such as “people person.”
Sales Skills
- Sales
- Lead generation
- Prospecting
- Cold calling
- Account management
- Business development
- Closing
- Sales presentations
- CRM management
- Upselling
- Cross-selling
- Pipeline management
- Sales forecasting
- Negotiation
For sales roles, try to connect your skills with results.
For example:
“Exceeded quarterly sales target by 17% through new client acquisition and account expansion.”
That is much stronger than simply listing “sales” in a skills section.
Marketing Skills
- Digital marketing
- SEO
- Search engine marketing
- Content marketing
- Social media marketing
- Email marketing
- Marketing analytics
- Google Analytics
- Google Ads
- Campaign management
- Brand management
- Market research
- Copywriting
- Content strategy
- Lead generation
- Conversion rate optimization
Marketing skills should match the actual role.
An SEO specialist may need SEO, keyword research, technical SEO, Google Search Console, and analytics.
A social media manager may need content planning, community management, social analytics, and platform-specific skills.
Technology and Computer Skills
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Word
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- Google Workspace
- Microsoft 365
- Database management
- Data entry
- CRM software
- Spreadsheet management
- Cloud software
- Basic cybersecurity
- Technical support
- Software troubleshooting
Do not list “computer skills” if you can name the actual tools you know.
Instead of:
“Computer skills”
write:
“Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets, Salesforce, and Microsoft 365.”
Specific information is more useful.
Data and Analytical Skills
- Data analysis
- Data visualization
- SQL
- Python
- R
- Excel analysis
- Tableau
- Power BI
- Reporting
- Forecasting
- Statistical analysis
- Dashboard development
For data-related jobs, these technical skills can be especially important.
Make sure your resume also explains how you used them.
Project Management Skills
- Project management
- Project planning
- Budget management
- Risk management
- Resource allocation
- Stakeholder management
- Agile
- Scrum
- Jira
- Asana
- Trello
- Process improvement
Project management skills are more convincing when paired with project scope and results.
For example:
“Managed a $250,000 software project across a six-person team and delivered the launch two weeks ahead of schedule.”
Finance and Accounting Skills
- Bookkeeping
- Accounts payable
- Accounts receivable
- Financial reporting
- Budgeting
- Forecasting
- Financial analysis
- Payroll
- Reconciliation
- QuickBooks
- Excel
- Tax preparation
- Audit support
For finance jobs, specific accounting software and technical skills are often more useful than broad soft-skill terms.
Human Resources Skills
- Recruiting
- Talent acquisition
- Interviewing
- Employee onboarding
- HRIS
- Employee relations
- Performance management
- Benefits administration
- Training and development
- Payroll administration
- Compliance
- Workforce planning
These skills can be useful for HR coordinators, recruiters, HR managers, and related positions.
Technical Skills for Software and IT Jobs
- Python
- Java
- JavaScript
- SQL
- Git
- GitHub
- APIs
- Cloud computing
- AWS
- Azure
- Docker
- Kubernetes
- Linux
- Network administration
- Cybersecurity
- Software testing
- Debugging
Technical candidates should be specific.
Rather than saying:
“Programming”
name the languages, frameworks, tools, and platforms you actually know.
AI Skills to Put on a Resume
AI skills are becoming relevant across many industries, but they should be listed honestly.
Depending on your experience, useful examples can include:
- Generative AI
- AI-assisted content creation
- Prompt writing
- AI research
- AI workflow automation
- AI data analysis
- AI tool evaluation
- AI-assisted coding
- ChatGPT
- Claude
- Microsoft Copilot
- Google Gemini
Do not claim “AI expertise” simply because you have used a chatbot a few times.
Instead, explain how AI helped you do real work.
For example:
“Used generative AI to speed up first-draft content production while reviewing all final copy manually.”
That tells the employer what you actually did.
What Are the Best Soft Skills to Put on a Resume?
Soft skills can help, but they should be selected carefully.
Some useful examples include:
- Communication
- Leadership
- Adaptability
- Teamwork
- Problem-solving
- Critical thinking
- Time management
- Organization
- Collaboration
- Active listening
- Emotional intelligence
- Conflict resolution
- Accountability
- Creativity
- Decision-making
Indeed’s current 2026 guidance also includes skills such as communication, active listening, interpersonal skills, leadership, management, problem-solving, and time management among common resume skills.
The problem is that many people list these words without showing evidence.
Instead of:
Leadership
show:
“Led a 10-person team through a new sales process and helped increase monthly revenue by 14%.”
The skill is still there, but now the employer can see proof.
What Skills Should You Put on a Resume With No Experience?
You can still create a useful skills section if you are a student, recent graduate, or first-time job seeker.
Think about skills gained from:
- School projects
- Internships
- Volunteer work
- Part-time jobs
- Freelance work
- Personal projects
- Student organizations
- Online training
For example, a recent graduate applying for an entry-level marketing job might list:
- Social media management
- Canva
- Content writing
- Google Analytics
- Market research
- Presentation skills
- Teamwork
But make sure you can explain where you learned or used each skill.
What Skills Should Career Changers Put on a Resume?
Career changers should focus heavily on transferable skills.
For example, someone moving from retail management to office operations might have:
- Team leadership
- Scheduling
- Inventory management
- Customer service
- Budget management
- Training
- Conflict resolution
Those skills can connect the old career to the new role.
The key is to make the connection clear instead of expecting the recruiter to figure it out.
How Many Skills Should You Put on a Resume?
There is no magic number for every resume.
Jobscan currently recommends around 6–12 key skills for the dedicated skills section, while Indeed says many job seekers list around 8–10 relevant skills.
That is a useful range, but relevance matters more than counting.
If a job needs six very specific skills, six strong skills are better than a list of 25 unrelated ones.
Where Should You Put Skills on Your Resume?
A dedicated Skills section is useful because recruiters can find your main abilities quickly.
For many resumes, it can sit below the professional summary and before or after the work experience section, depending on the layout.
But do not stop there.
Your most important skills should also appear naturally in your work experience.
For example:
Skills
- Salesforce
- Account management
- Lead generation
Work experience
“Managed 70+ Salesforce accounts and generated an average of 35 qualified leads per month.”
Now the skills section tells the reader what you know, while the experience section shows how you used it.
Coursera recommends this kind of approach because skills can be shown in several parts of the resume instead of being isolated in one section.
How to Choose Skills From a Job Description
This is one of the most useful steps you can take.
Start by opening the job posting.
Look for:
Required skills
Preferred skills
Software
Certifications
Technical knowledge
Repeated terms
Then make a simple list.
For example, suppose the job description mentions:
- Salesforce
- Account management
- Customer retention
- Reporting
- Communication
If those skills match your experience, bring them into your resume.
Put the most important ones higher in your Skills section and show them in your work experience.
Do not copy skills you do not actually have.
How to Make Your Skills Section ATS-Friendly
Applicant tracking systems can scan resumes for information that matches a job posting.
That is one reason relevant keywords matter.
But trying to “beat” an ATS by stuffing your resume with keywords is not a good strategy.
Use the actual name of the skill when it is relevant.
For example:
Better:
“Salesforce CRM”
Less useful:
“Customer software experience”
If the employer specifically asks for Salesforce and you really know Salesforce, using the exact term makes your experience easier to identify.
Your formatting matters too.
CareerOneStop recommends a clean resume layout with standard headings and warns that complex formatting, text boxes, images, and other design elements can create parsing problems with some systems. You can use its resume formatting guidance when checking your layout.
Skills You Should Usually Leave Off
Some skills are too general to add much value.
Examples include:
- Hardworking
- Punctual
- Nice
- Friendly
- Honest
- Quick learner
- Good personality
- Motivated
- Works well under pressure
These qualities may be true, but they are difficult to prove.
Instead, show them through your experience.
For example, instead of:
“Good under pressure”
write:
“Managed customer support operations during a 40% increase in ticket volume while maintaining a 24-hour response target.”
That gives the employer something concrete.
Do Not List Skills You Cannot Defend
Every skill on your resume can become an interview question.
If you list SQL, be prepared to explain what you have used it for.
If you list Salesforce, be prepared to discuss how you used it.
If you list project management, be ready to describe a project you managed.
This is especially important with AI skills.
Do not list a tool simply because you opened it a few times.
List skills you can use with reasonable confidence.
Should You Add Skill Levels?
Sometimes.
You can use simple labels such as:
- Beginner
- Intermediate
- Advanced
But rating yourself “10/10” or using five-star graphics is usually less useful because there is no standard behind the score.
For technical skills, a better option is to give context.
For example:
“Python — used for data analysis and reporting”
is more useful than:
“Python — 5/5”
Skills Section Examples
Example 1: Marketing Manager
Skills
- Digital marketing
- SEO
- Google Analytics
- Google Ads
- Content strategy
- Email marketing
- Campaign management
- Market research
Example 2: Software Developer
Skills
- Python
- JavaScript
- SQL
- Git
- GitHub
- REST APIs
- AWS
- Docker
- Software testing
Example 3: Project Manager
Skills
- Project planning
- Budget management
- Risk management
- Stakeholder management
- Agile
- Scrum
- Jira
- Team leadership
Example 4: Customer Service Representative
Skills
- Customer service
- Complaint resolution
- CRM
- Written communication
- Active listening
- Problem-solving
- Order management
- Customer retention
Example 5: Recent Graduate
Skills
- Microsoft Excel
- Google Workspace
- Research
- Presentation skills
- Social media
- Communication
- Teamwork
- Time management
How to Make Your Skills Section Stand Out
A skills section should be easy to scan.
Do not write a paragraph.
A simple list or grouped format usually works better.
For example:
Marketing: SEO, Google Ads, Email Marketing, Content Strategy
Analytics: Excel, Google Analytics, Looker Studio
Tools: HubSpot, Canva, WordPress
This can be especially useful when you have many technical skills and want to organize them without making the section too long. Resume Worded also recommends grouping related skills when that makes a large skills section easier to read.
Should You Use an AI Resume Builder to Choose Your Skills?
You can.
An AI resume builder can compare your resume with a job description, identify skills you may want to highlight, and help rewrite your skills section.
That can save time.
But treat AI suggestions as suggestions.
The software does not know your actual abilities unless you provide accurate information.
A tool may recommend a skill because it appears in the job description.
That does not mean you should add it.
Only include a skill you genuinely have.
If you are also working on your overall resume format, a professional resume builder can help you create separate versions for different job types while keeping your skills organized.
Skills for Remote Jobs
Remote roles often need a mix of technical and workplace skills.
Depending on the position, useful examples can include:
- Written communication
- Remote collaboration
- Time management
- Project management
- Slack
- Microsoft Teams
- Zoom
- Google Workspace
- Asana
- Trello
- Independent work
- Task management
Again, only use the tools you actually know.
Skills for Entry-Level Jobs
For an entry-level role, focus on skills you can prove through school, projects, internships, volunteer work, or part-time experience.
Useful examples include:
- Microsoft Excel
- Communication
- Research
- Presentation
- Customer service
- Social media
- Data entry
- Organization
- Teamwork
- Time management
- Canva
- Google Workspace
You do not need to pretend you have senior-level expertise.
Strong, honest skills are more useful than impressive-sounding claims.
Skills for Managers
Managers can include both people skills and business skills.
Examples:
- Team leadership
- Hiring
- Coaching
- Performance management
- Budget management
- Strategic planning
- Conflict resolution
- Project management
- KPI reporting
- Process improvement
- Stakeholder management
- Decision-making
Try to connect these skills to business results.
For example:
“Managed a 20-person team and reduced employee turnover by 12%.”
Final Tips for Choosing Resume Skills
Before you submit your resume, ask yourself:
Does this skill match the job?
Can I prove that I have it?
Have I used it in a real situation?
Does my work experience support it?
Is it written using the employer’s terminology when appropriate?
Is my list short enough to scan quickly?
Did I remove skills that are too general or outdated?
If the answer is yes, your skills section is doing its job.
Final Thoughts
The right skills to put on a resume depend on the job.
There is no single list that works for everyone.
Technical skills such as Excel, SQL, Salesforce, SEO, Python, accounting, or project management can be valuable when they match the position.
Soft skills such as communication, leadership, teamwork, problem-solving, and time management can also help, especially when you show them through real examples.
Start with the job description.
Choose the skills that genuinely match your background.
Put the most relevant ones in your Skills section.
Then prove the important skills through your work experience.
A recruiter should not have to guess whether you can do the job.
Your resume should make that clear.
