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Manual Tester Resume Sample for 2024 (Various Levels)

Create Your Resume Now

Our customers have been hired by:

"A manual tester is just a failed software developer." Have you heard that one already? The truth is, the recruiter doesn't really know what the manual testing job is about. They might think you're just an error hunter.

Prove you're ten times more than that with a manual tester resume that will pass every possible scenario.

Here's how.

The guide will show you: 

  • A manual tester resume example better than 9 out of 10 other resumes.
  • How to write a manual testing resume sample that will land you more interviews.
  • Tips and examples of how to put skills and achievements on a manual testing resume.
  • How to describe your experience on a resume for a manual tester to get any job you want.

Here’s a manual resume sample made with our builder.

Want to save time and have your resume ready in 5 minutes? Try our resume builder. It’s fast and easy to use. Plus, you’ll get ready-made content to add with one click. See 20+ resume templates and create your resume here.

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Sample resume made with our builder—See more resume examples here.

Wish to explore your possibilities? See other relevant resume guides:

Manual Tester Resume Sample

Crystal E. Wilson

Manual Tester

1996 Clifford Street

San Jose, CA 95131

510-698-1741

chrystalewilson@email.com

linkedin.com/in/crystalewilson

Summary

ISTQB Advanced Level-certified manual tester with 3 years of experience. Motivated to boost efficiency and manual testing effectiveness at W3T3ST. At Test123, designed and implemented an evidence management template, shortening the evidence gathering process time by 2 hours. Experienced user of Selenium and Bugzilla, and always on the pursuit towards ideas from both sides of extreme.

Experience

Manual Tester

Test123, San Jose, CA

October 2019-Present

  • Cooperated with developers to design 50+ test cases for regular maintenance and enhancements for internal applications.
  • Executed functional testing of ~300 test scenarios with Selenium each year.
  • Acted as a Subject-Matter Expert in regression testing, carrying out ~30 training sessions for newcomers and stakeholders.
  • Worked with JIRA for test case management.
  • Supervised and co-created testing and defect-tracking documentation with 100% closure rate.

Key achievement: Shortened the evidence gathering process by 2 hours by creating an evidence management template.

Software Developer (Intern)

QAstion, San Francisco, CA

July 2018-September 2018

  • Performed maintenance on 4 application programs.
  • Created structured documentation of all end-user requirements during the liaison between the business, development team, and client.

Key achievement: Supported testing and automation bug identification, pointing out over 3 process improvements.

Education

2019 B.S. in Computer Science

University of San Francisco, San Francisco, CA

Skills

  • Testpad, Selenium
  • Jira, Bugzilla
  • Tableau, MS Excel, VBA Fundamentals
  • Scrum, Lean
  • Java, SQL
  • Test Scripts
  • Prioritization and Time Management
  • Communication Skills

Certificates

  • ISTQB Advanced Level, 2020
  • FITA’s Manual Testing Certification Training, 2021

Udemy Training

  • QA Manual Software Testing
  • Become a Software Tester

See how to write a quality resume for a manual tester:

1. Gather Format Requirements for Your Manual Testing Resume 

What’s the rule for building an app? Making sure it’s easy to grow. Venmo took it to heart, and see where they got. Your resume will grow with time, too, so to save you some for regular maintenance, follow the below standards of writing a resume:

  • Set 1” resume margins to give yourself enough whitespace.
  • Choose one 12pt resume font. Don’t test extreme configurations here.
  • Make 1-1.5 line spacing between sentences and double space between paragraphs.
  • Pick the reverse-chronological resume format and stick to it throughout.
  • Introduce yourself in the resume header by providing your basic personal information.
  • Structure your resume and divide it into the following sections: Contact Information, Resume Summary / Objective, Work Experience, Education, and Skills.
  • Leave room for other resume sections like languages, certifications, awards, or hobbies and interests. 
  • Refer to the job description to find out what file format recruiters need. Have both PDF and Word resumes at hand.
  • Write a one-page-long resume or face the consequences of tl;dr.

You can hear here and there that you shouldn’t be afraid of testing in production. But don’t do that with your resume. Check the specs because there’s no going back from hitting that send button.

Here’s our guide that answers all question about resumes: How To Write A Resume

2. Analyze Your Work Experience With Scrutiny

Now’s time for some serious stuff. It won’t be about breaking things, but destroying the illusion that they work. See possible bugs in the work experience section of a resume:

  • Overloaded resume with irrelevant experience—it doesn’t matter if you’re on the job market for a long time. Recruiters are interested only in the work experience that has to do with the job you’re after.
  • No experience at all—as a junior, you think you don’t have relevant experience. That’s wrong on so many levels. Any internship or volunteering you did, student club or association you joined, and even independent projects can play to your advantage.
  • Passive voice—you’ve been an active team member who got the job done and did it well, no? Then don’t hide behind the passive voice and use resume action verbs.
  • Responsibilities—one does not simply list them in resumes. To get the gig, use bullet points with the PAR formula. Prove you solved the Problem by listing your Actions leading to Results. Hiring managers are looking for accomplishments in your resume.
  • Random sentences—sorry, three times no. Your hiring manager wants specific qualities and skills. Guard the end-user satisfaction realm, find the resume keywords, and scatter them all over the resume.
  • Incomplete or confusing details—this one should take you back to resume formatting. You can’t fail to give correct information about your job title and previous companies, i.e., name, address, and employment dates. Your resume often serves as grounds for background checks.
  • Lies—there’s little to no chance you’ll get away with lying on your resume or cover letter. If your story doesn’t add up, you’ll get busted. And job-less.

Let’s put them to test now:

Manual Testing Resume for Years of Experience

RIGHT

Manual Tester

Test123, San Jose, CA

October 2019-present

  • Cooperated with developers to design 50+ test cases for regular maintenance and enhancements for internal applications.
  • Executed functional testing of ~300 test scenarios with Selenium each year.
  • Acted as a Subject-Matter Expert in regression testing, carrying out ~30 training sessions for newcomers and stakeholders.
  • Worked with JIRA for test case management.
  • Supervised and co-created testing and defect-tracking documentation with 100% closure rate.

Key achievement: Created an evidence management template that the testing team later implemented, thus shortened the evidence gathering process by 2 hours.

You own it!

The job title, company details, and dates look perfect. Your bullet points with quantified results prove you had an impact at your job. And what an achievement! A juicy cherry on top.

You know how to follow quality standards. But what if you didn’t?

WRONG

Test123, 2019-present

  • Worked with developers on test scenarios.
  • Used Selenium for functional testing.
  • Trained newcomers and stakeholders on regression testing.
  • Responsible for testing documentation.
  • Have experience with Jira.

Next! That’s what your hiring manager said when they took 6 seconds to scan your resume. At best.

So, DO NOT make a list of responsibilities like above. Even though you tried to tailor your manual tester resume and used the keywords, they say nothing about your 3+ years of experience as a manual tester, let alone your achievements. And your job title’s missing.

Gee. Let’s move on to examples for junior manual testers.

Manual Testing Resume for Freshers

RIGHT

Software Developer (Intern)

QAstion, San Francisco, CA

July 2018-September 2018

  • Performed maintenance on 4 application programs.
  • Created structured documentation of all end-user requirements during the liaison between the business, development team, and client.

Key achievement:

  • Supported testing and automation bug identification, pointing out over 3 process improvements.

That’s so cool! You got the internship while you were still at uni. It won’t go unnoticed. And, instead of creating a random list of responsibilities, you chose bullets that match what manual testers do. Great job.

Plus, who said interns couldn’t have achievements? 

WRONG

Intern

QAstion

2018-2018

  • Responsible for the company’s product software.
  • Documentation with the end-user requirements.
  • Tested software and identified bugs.

These examples even sound funny. What did you do exactly with that documentation? It seems redundant if nobody knows that.

No specific and quantifiable results and no mention of what kind of internship you did make this entire experience irrelevant. There’s no place for irrelevant experience in your resume.

Find more work experience examples in this guide: How To Write The Perfect Work Experience Section

Creating a resume with our builder is incredibly simple. Follow our step-by-step guide and use content from Certified Professional Resume Writers to have a resume ready in minutes.

When you’re done, our professional resume builder will score your resume and our resume checker will tell you exactly how to make it better.

3. Design Your Way to Success With Your Education Section

You can, but not necessarily will get a manual tester job without a degree related to computer science or engineering. So if you’re lucky to have one, don’t hold your breath and put your degree in the resume. You’ll be a lot closer to meeting the business requirements with a relevant degree.

In the reverse-chronological format, education section usually sits between employment and skills. If you’re an entry-level candidate, education is your leverage—move it above the work experience section.

How the education section should look like in production:

Manual Tester Resume [Education]

RIGHT

2019 B.S. in Computer Science

University of San Francisco, San Francisco, CA

Simple as that.

Spell out the name of your degree and mention the graduation date. You have manual tester experience, so going into the details in your educational background is unnecessary.

What about a junior manual tester:

Junior Manual Tester Resume [Education]

RIGHT

B.S. in Computer Science

University of San Francisco, San Francisco, CA

Expected graduation date: 2021

Relevant Coursework: Software Development, Computer Architecture, Computer Networks, Operating Systems, Intro to Database Systems, Data Visualizations, Computers and Society.

Volunteering: Wrote an article to the University Newspaper about my experience during the Software QA Testing Bootcamp, winning in the category of the most educational piece of the issue.

Membership: Member of the Developer Student Club.

If you’re about to graduate, don’t worry about an unfinished bachelor degree on your resume. Writing an expected date of graduation will do. Hiring managers understand you’ll be trying to secure a job while finishing school.

You can also strengthen your chances by listing volunteering, memberships or relevant coursework. They’ll introduce you to the market as an engaged and growth-driven candidate.

Find more answers to: How To Correctly List Education On A Resume

4. Write the a-List of Manual Testing Skills in Your Resume

Have you ever imagined you’ll be able to listen to audio from your sunglasses? Because you can now, thanks to Bose.

“Shoot!I’d test the heck out of them!” You have to keep up to be on top. Not here to disappoint, but it all comes down to growing your knowledge and skillset. See the list of skills Jerry Weinberg would approve of:

Manual Testing Skills in a Resume

So here’s the deal. You can’t just take a few of the above and paste them into your resume. Your resume needs to pass the Applicant Tracking Software to land on your hiring manager’s desk.

To make your resume ATS-friendly, use resume keywords. You’ll find them in the job description. Tailor your skills section by taking out the skills and qualifications your employer mentions in the job ad.

See what the list of skills will look if the company wanted to hire a manual tester who does software analysis and bug fixing, and can work with code.

Sample Skills Section for a Manual Tester Resume

RIGHT
  • Experience in manual testing and test execution using Testpad and Selenium
  • Test case and bug / defect management with Jira and Bugzilla
  • Skilled in reporting tools like Tableau and MS Excel 
  • Building macros with VBA Fundamentals
  • Knowledge of agile methodologies: Scrum and Lean
  • Coding language: Java, SQL
  • Prioritization and time management skills
  • Highly skilled in verbal and written communication

You must’ve written a resume based on our guides because this is fire!

You answered every single requirement your hiring manager has. And what an excellent choice of adding hard and soft skills to your resume! Such a combination is the most desirable—it reverts you to your human form.

Make yourself irreplaceable already at this stage and prove your skills in other sections, too. Work history and resume summary/objective are perfect for such a purpose.

Sample Skills Section for an Entry Level Manual Testing Resume 

RIGHT
  • Knowledge of the testing process in Selenium
  • Understanding and writing in Java 
  • Experience in logging test cases into Jira
  • Using Bugzilla for bug-tracking
  • Analytical skills
  • Teamwork skills
  • Effective communication

That’s exactly what reliable skills for a fresher manual testing resume should look like. You, too, try to sneak them in-between your achievements. Just like dropping little it-doesn’t-work warning signs for software developers here and there.

Remember you mentioned in the education section an award-winning article for the University Newspaper? That’s reinforced evidence of your effective communication skills.

Don’t worry that your skills section seems bare compared to a senior. Hiring managers pay attention to both your strengths and attitude towards getting real-life experience. 

Based on an analysis of 11 million resumes created using our builder, we discovered that:

  • Manual Testers usually list 20.5 skills on their resumes.
  • The most common skills for Manual Testers are user acceptance testing, sanity testing, agile methodology, test case design, and smoke testing.
  • Resumes for Manual Testers are, on average, 2.3 pages long.

5. Test Out Other Sections on Your Manual Tester Resume

Remember your parents say: “You could at least learn something useful since you’re sitting on your computer all day.” Well, apparently you did, and if you haven’t already mentioned it in the previous entries, extra resume sections are the right place to do it.

Additional sections will give you bonus points for each bullet. It’s almost as if you were testing a feature, and it worked. That’s how your hiring manager feels when they see one of the below sections with relevant examples:

What would work for a manual testing professional, then?

Manual Testing Resume Sample [Additional Sections]

RIGHT

Certificates

  • ISTQB Advanced Level, 2020
  • FITA’s Manual Testing Certification Training, 2021

Udemy Training

  • QA Manual Software Testing
  • Become a Software Tester

That’s brilliant. You’re saying that you cut down on fantasy and got down to serious work. 

Industry certification proves you’re serious about your career and that you’ve made an effort to get better at your job. And, it’s a fantastic way to support your qualifications.

Junior Manual Testing Resume Sample [Additional Sections]

RIGHT

Volunteering

  • Volunteer tutor at a local high school math club.

Hobbies & Interests

  • Helping a family member in a non-profit website maintenance.

Again, well done! You shouldn’t give up on listing your hobbies and interests if they have a clear connection to what you want to do as a career. 

Volunteering is also an example of your motivation and engagement that hiring managers seek in their entry-level employees. They believe you’ll be as much active at your job and getting real-life experience as you are with your extracurriculars.

Wondering what to write on your resume to beat the competition? See Ways To Make Your Resume Stand Out

6. Deploy Your Manual Testing Resume Summary or Resume Objective

You’re almost done, so it’s time for software testing documentation. Report on the characteristics and include a strategy on how to bring improvements. There are two ways of doing it:

A resume summary is a summary of your key accomplishments, work experience, and skills. So, you do that at the end, or else there’s nothing to summarize, amirite? But—

If you’re just kicking off with your career, a resume objective is a right choice. A resume objective includes your skills and distinctive traits while highlighting your career goals. You use it to reinforce what you wrote in other sections of your resume. So, it needs to come last, too.

For both, relevant and ATS-compliant are the buzzwords. Take a glance at your resume and mark all the items you are the most proud of. Choose 2 or 3 of them—the statement shouldn’t be long—and use the below formula to create your selling points:

Strong character trait + Job title / Position you’re applying for + Company name + What you want to do for the employer and how + Key achievement / 2-3 Skills

After deployment, they look like this:

Manual Tester Resume Summary

RIGHT

ISTQB Advanced Level-certified manual tester with 3 years of experience. Motivated to boost efficiency and manual testing effectiveness at W3T3ST. At Test123, designed and implemented an evidence management template, shortening the evidence gathering process time by 2 hours. Experienced user of Selenium and Bugzilla, and always on the pursuit towards ideas from both sides of extreme.

WRONG

Manual tester with 3 years of experience. Motivated to join the manual testing team at W3T3ST. Self-development is my drive. I’m an experienced user of Selenium for test execution and Bugzilla for bug tracking. 

Ugh. One person wrote these two. Can you imagine? How can they be so different!

The first example follows the formula. No magic spells, no creativity potions. There are action verbs, strong character traits, relevant skills, and achievements. There’s also a promise of coming crashing down and bringing improvements. You’d better keep it when you join the ranks!

The second one, though, is correct. But correct is not enough for landing the job. You must stand out, and you can do that only when you show off your results. 

Junior Manual Testing Resume Objective

RIGHT

A self-motivated B.S. in Computer Science, seeking to join the manual testing team at W3T3ST to grow his test scripting skills. An entry-level tester with a knack for spotting minute details. At QAstion, put forward 3 successful process improvements during software analysis. 

WRONG

B.S. in Computer Science seeking an entry-level position at W3T3ST. An entry-level tester with data analysis and software testing experience. Motivated to improve designing and executing test cases.

This is a classic example of achievements winning over wishful thinking. If there’s a skill you want to boast about, you’d better back it up with evidence.

You don’t think you can personalize your resume? See: How To Describe Yourself In A Resume

7. Maintain Your Hiring Manager’s Interest With the Cover Letter

Good news! Employment of manual testers is projected to grow 22 percent from 2019 to 2029. You’re probably asking yourself now: why, then, is a cover letter necessary? Around 50% of hiring managers still expect to get one.

Plus some job ads will require one… So here’s a checklist of what you need to do to write the perfect cover letter to support your manual tester resume:

Read more about: What To Include In A Job-Winning Cover Letter

Plus, a great cover letter that matches your resume will give you an advantage over other candidates. You can write it in our cover letter builder here. Here's what it may look like:

See more cover letter templates and start writing.

Key Takeaways

Here’s how to write a manual testing resume with years of experience or a junior:

  • Start right. Choose a professional manual testing resume template.
  • But don’t just start. Find resume keywords in the job description and keep them in mind every time you tap the keyboard.
  • Use the P.A.R. formula throughout the entire resume. Each of the sections should speak about your accomplishments and prove your skills.
  • Either you have experience or not, be relevant in your manual tester resume.
  • Write the resume summary / objective last. It’ll be easier for you.
  • Remember about bonus hiring points from the additional sections.
  • Support your manual testing resume with the cover letter that reinforces your application.

Thank you so much for reading my guide!

  • Is there anything you find difficult in the resume or cover letter writing? 
  • What do you struggle with the most when working on your manual tester resume?

Let me know in the comments, and hop onto the discussion!

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This article has been reviewed by our editorial team to make sure it follows Zety's editorial guidelines. We’re committed to sharing our expertise and giving you trustworthy career advice tailored to your needs. High-quality content is what brings over 40 million readers to our site every year. But we don't stop there. Our team conducts original research to understand the job market better, and we pride ourselves on being quoted by top universities and prime media outlets from around the world.

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Katarzyna Furman
Katarzyna is a career expert dedicated to encouraging growth in job hunters through building perfect resumes, CVs, and cover letters. She'll help you realize you have a successful track record that only needs to see the daylight.
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