QA Engineer CV Examples & Writing Guide

This sample is for a QA engineer with seven years of testing who moved from manual QA analyst to automation and SDET (software development engineer in test) work at a payments company. The name and employers are made up. Keep the structure and replace the stack, test counts and pipeline numbers with your own.

QA engineer job adverts get many applicants, and the first screen is usually a QA manager or engineering lead who reads for four things.

• Manual or automation, and how much of each. "Automated 220 of 350 regression cases" answers it. If you are manual only, say so plainly and show depth in test design, exploratory testing and domain knowledge; those roles still exist and pay.
• Stack. The framework (Playwright, Selenium, Cypress, Appium), the language you write tests in, the API and performance tools, and the CI system the tests run in. Recruiters filter on these words; managers check whether the combination is plausible.
• Evidence the tests were useful. Regression time, escaped-defect counts, flaky rate, release frequency, defects found before production. A suite that nobody trusts is worth nothing, so numbers about reliability matter as much as the number of tests.
• Domain and process. Payments, healthcare, e-commerce, embedded, mobile: each has its own risk and compliance rules. Also whether you have worked inside Scrum teams, written acceptance criteria and reviewed pull requests, or sat in a separate QA phase at the end.

“The first thing checked is whether the automation claims hold up: which framework, which language, where it runs and how many tests are actually green. A candidate who writes "1,100 Playwright tests in GitHub Actions, 22 minutes, under 1% flaky" has already answered the first three interview questions.”

A personal statement of three or four lines: years, what you test, your stack, one or two results, certification if you have one. Use a career objective only for a first QA job, and even then name the tools you have practised and what you have tested on your own.

Most QA bullets describe activity ("performed manual and automated testing"). Rewrite each to show the tool, the scale and what changed. If you cannot share exact figures, use rounded ones or percentages.

Group skills so a manager can see your stack in five seconds. List only tools you could be interviewed on tomorrow; QA interviews often include a live coding or framework-design question.

Test types and design:

• Functional, regression, smoke, sanity, exploratory, user acceptance (UAT)
• API, integration, contract and end-to-end testing
• Performance and load testing; security testing basics (OWASP Top 10)
• Accessibility (WCAG 2.2 AA), cross-browser, mobile and localisation testing
• Test design techniques: equivalence partitioning, boundary values, decision tables, risk-based prioritisation

Automation and languages (name your primary framework first):

• Web: Playwright, Selenium WebDriver, Cypress, WebdriverIO
• Mobile: Appium, Espresso (Android), XCUITest (iOS)
• Languages: JavaScript/TypeScript, Java, Python, C#; test runners such as Jest, TestNG, JUnit, pytest, NUnit
• API: Postman and Newman, REST Assured, Karate, Pact for contract tests
• Performance: JMeter, k6, Gatling, Locust

Pipeline, data and process tools:

• CI/CD: GitHub Actions, Jenkins, GitLab CI, Azure DevOps, CircleCI
• Git and pull-request review; Docker for test environments; basic AWS or Azure
• SQL (joins, aggregates) for data validation; Postgres, MySQL, SQL Server
• Test management and tracking: Jira, TestRail, Xray, Zephyr, qTest
• Device and browser clouds: BrowserStack, Sauce Labs, LambdaTest
• Agile practices: Scrum ceremonies, acceptance criteria, definition of done, BDD with Cucumber or SpecFlow

Software QA is one of the more open doors into tech, but "no experience" cannot mean "no evidence." Entry-level QA job adverts ask for a basic understanding of the test process, one bug tracker, some SQL and, increasingly, one automation tool. You can build all of that in a few months and put it on the page.

1. 1Put "QA Tester" or "Junior QA Engineer" under your name, not "Recent Graduate" or your old job title.
2. 2Write a two-line career objective naming the tools you have practised (Jira, Postman, one automation framework) and one thing you have tested on your own.
3. 3Create a GitHub repository with a small automation project: 30 to 60 tests in Playwright or Cypress against a public demo site, a README that explains the structure, and a CI badge from GitHub Actions. Link it in your header.
4. 4Test real software and keep records: report bugs on open-source projects, join a crowdtesting platform such as uTest or Testlio, or do a beta programme. "Filed 40 accepted bug reports" is experience.
5. 5Take the ISTQB Foundation Level (CTFL) exam. It is the one QA certification recruiters recognise at entry level, and it teaches the vocabulary job adverts use.
6. 6Translate your previous job into QA terms: customer support means reproducing issues and writing clear reports; data entry means attention to detail and SQL; retail means understanding a checkout flow from the user's side.
7. 7One page, PDF, no photo.

No licence is required for software QA, and most hiring managers weigh a public test framework above any certificate. Certifications still help at entry level and with recruiters filtering on keywords. List only exams you passed, with the body and year.

• ISTQB Certified Tester Foundation Level (CTFL): the standard entry certification worldwide; the 2023 syllabus (v4.0) is current.
• ISTQB advanced and specialist certificates: Test Analyst, Technical Test Analyst, Test Automation Engineer (CT-TAE), Agile Tester, Performance Testing, Mobile Application Testing. List the exact name.
• Cloud basics for test environments: AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner or Microsoft Azure Fundamentals (AZ-900).
• Vendor courses that carry weight when paired with a repo: Test Automation University (free, Applitools), Postman API Fundamentals Student Expert, BrowserStack certifications.
• Scrum: Professional Scrum Master I (Scrum.org) or Certified ScrumMaster (Scrum Alliance) for QA leads who run ceremonies.
• Education: a degree in computer science, information systems or engineering is common but not required; bootcamp graduates and career changers are hired on portfolio. List the degree, classification, university and year; after your first QA job, leave out modules and grades below degree level.

• One page for entry-level and junior testers; two pages are normal in the UK once you have several years of experience, and for senior SDETs and QA leads with several frameworks and teams to describe.
• Order: header (with GitHub and LinkedIn links), personal statement, skills grouped by type, experience, certifications, education. Put a "Projects" section above experience if you are entry level.
• Plain single-column layout, like the cvplex tech-dark or ats-classic template. Engineering recruiters use applicant tracking systems; no photo, no skill bars, no two-column tables.
• Make the GitHub link count: pin the framework repo, give it a README with setup steps, structure and a screenshot of a passing CI run. Remove or archive half-finished repos.
• Match your LinkedIn headline to the CV title ("QA Engineer | Playwright, TypeScript, CI/CD"). Recruiters cross-check.
• Dates in month and year. Contract QA roles are common; label them "(contract)" so short stints read correctly.
• Save as PDF named Firstname-Lastname-QA-Engineer-CV.pdf. In the US the document is called a resume and one page is more common there; the content rules are the same.

Words to mirror from the job advert when they apply to you: test automation, test framework, Selenium, Playwright, Cypress, Appium, API testing, Postman, REST, regression, CI/CD, Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Jira, TestRail, SQL, agile, Scrum, acceptance criteria, test plan, test strategy, defect, root cause, performance testing, JMeter, cross-browser, mobile, SDET, shift-left.