Best Resume Font and Size for ATS (2026)
Short answer: one plain, widely-installed font (Arial, Calibri or Times New Roman), 10.5-12pt for body text, 14-16pt for headings, used consistently throughout. Font choice itself is a small factor in whether a resume parses cleanly -- layout (columns, tables, text-in-images) matters far more, as [how ATS actually reads your resume](/posts/how-ats-reads-your-resume) covers in depth. This post is specifically about the font and size question, which still has real, if narrower, stakes.
The short answer, by element
There is no single "correct" font or size an ATS is built to require -- parsers read whatever text layer a PDF or Word file contains, regardless of typeface. The real risk is a size small enough to force the parser (or a human reviewer) to work harder than it should, or a font exotic enough that it fails to embed correctly when the file is converted. Stay inside the ranges below and the font/size question stops being something worth spending more time on.
| Element | Safe range | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Body text | 10.5-12pt (never below 10pt) | Gateway Community College Career Services: "Use 12 font whenever possible. If you must choose a smaller font size use 11, but do not go under 10. A font size of 10 should be last resort and should be used after adjusting page margins first." |
| Section headings | 14-16pt | Common career-services guidance; keep one consistent step up from body text, not a dramatic jump |
| Font family | Arial, Calibri or Times New Roman (one font throughout) | MIT UPOP Resume Guidelines: recommends easy-to-read fonts (Arial, Times New Roman, Calibri), one font throughout, no script fonts |
| Styling to avoid | Multiple fonts, underlining, graphics, color blocks | MIT UPOP Resume Guidelines lists these together as "over-formatting" |
Why font family matters less than people think
A parser extracts the text layer of a file and maps it to fields -- it does not evaluate typeface the way a human eye does. Arial, Calibri, Times New Roman, Garamond and Georgia are all standard, widely-embedded fonts that convert and extract cleanly; none of them is measurably "more ATS-friendly" than the others in any mechanical sense. MIT's UPOP Resume Guidelines recommend sticking to one of these throughout the document and avoiding script or decorative fonts, mainly for the same reason a human reviewer would prefer them: consistent, immediately legible text, not a parsing requirement specific to any one of them.
Where font choice actually creates risk is mixing fonts, or picking something obscure enough that it isn't embedded in the file and gets substituted on a different machine -- which can shift spacing and, in rare cases, corrupt character extraction. One font, used consistently, removes that risk entirely regardless of which of the handful of standard choices you pick.
Why size has a real floor
Size is the part of this question with an actual downside if you get it wrong. Going below 10pt to fit more content on one page is the single most common font mistake career-services guidance flags: Gateway Community College's Career Services resume guide is explicit that 10pt should be a last resort used only after margins have already been tightened, not a first move to save space. Below that, both a human reviewer skimming quickly and some PDF-to-text extraction paths start losing reliability -- not because of any ATS-specific rule, but because very small type is harder to render and extract consistently across different file viewers and devices.
If your resume is running long, the fix is cutting content or tightening margins and line spacing first -- not shrinking body text past 10pt. How long should a resume be covers the length side of that trade-off directly.
What actually breaks ATS parsing (it usually isn't the font)
Underlining, text boxes, graphics and heavy color blocks are a bigger mechanical risk than font or size choice. These are exactly the elements MIT's UPOP guidelines group together as "over-formatting," and the reasoning connects directly to parsing mechanics: underlined text and text inside a graphic or text box don't always survive extraction as clean, correctly-ordered text the way a plain paragraph does. How ATS actually reads your resume covers why column layouts and image-based content are the real structural risk -- font and size are a much smaller lever by comparison, worth getting right but not the thing to obsess over once it is.
Build it in YourCVMaker
Every one of our 229 templates ships with a safe, consistent font and size already set -- you are choosing a design, not hand-picking typography and hoping it holds up. Every download also includes a separate ATS-Friendly PDF built from real, selectable text and tested automatically before every release, so the font-and-size question is handled for you on the file that actually gets parsed. Browse the full template library or check your current resume for free to see exactly what a parser can recover from it today.
Frequently asked questions
- Does ATS software reject resumes for using the "wrong" font?
- No single font gets flagged or rejected by name. The real risk is an obscure font that fails to embed and gets substituted, or type small enough that extraction becomes unreliable -- not a specific typeface being "banned."
- Is Times New Roman outdated for resumes?
- It is more traditional-looking than Arial or Calibri, which is a design/taste question, not a parsing one -- MIT's own UPOP guidelines list it alongside Arial and Calibri as an acceptable, easy-to-read choice. Pick based on the look you want; all three parse the same.
- Can I use a different font for my name or headings?
- A slightly larger size for your name and section headings is standard and expected. A genuinely different font family for headings versus body text is the kind of mixing MIT's guidelines group under "over-formatting" -- one font throughout is the safer, simpler default.
- My resume is one line over a page -- should I shrink the font instead of cutting content?
- Tighten margins and line spacing first. Career-services guidance treats 10pt as a last resort to use only once those adjustments are exhausted, not a first move -- cutting a weaker bullet usually serves the resume better than uniformly shrinking every line.