Jake's Resume vs Harvard Template: Which to Use? (2026)
Two of the most recommended resume templates compared: layout, ATS results, and industry fit. Plus the tech vs finance rule of thumb that settles it for most people.
Thejus Sunny
Engineering + hiring perspective
If you're choosing a resume template, two names come up constantly: Jake's Resume and the Harvard resume template. Both are widely recommended, both are clean and professional, and both are ATS-friendly. So which one should you use?
This guide gives you an honest, side-by-side comparison. No hype, no sales pitch. Just the differences that actually matter when you're applying for jobs.
The Short Answer
TL;DR: which template should you use?
- Tech and engineering roles: Jake's Resume. Projects-first density is what software recruiters expect.
- Finance, consulting, and corporate roles: the Harvard template. It's the format those recruiters have been reading for decades.
- Students: pick by your strongest section. Strong projects, use Jake's. Strong leadership and education, use Harvard.
That's the rule of thumb. The rest of this guide is the reasoning behind it, plus the edge cases where the rule of thumb is wrong.
Where Each Template Comes From
Jake's Resume
Created by Jake Gutierrez, a software engineer. Originally a LaTeX template hosted on Overleaf, designed specifically for CS students and software engineers. It spread through r/EngineeringResumes, r/cscareerquestions, and peer-to-peer recommendations in CS programs. It's the most forked resume template on Overleaf, with roughly 50,000 forks, which makes it something close to the community default for software roles.
The Harvard Resume Template
The Harvard template comes from Harvard's career office: the Mignone Center for Career Success, which most people still know by its older name, the Office of Career Services (OCS). It ships as a Word document inside Harvard's resume and cover letter guide, and it has been copied, lightly restyled, and redistributed by university career centers for decades. When a career counselor hands you "the standard resume format," this is usually the one they mean.
The education-first ordering is deliberate. The template was built for students and new grads recruiting into consulting, banking, and other corporate pipelines, where the school name and GPA are the first things a screener checks. That's also why it has a Leadership & Activities section instead of Projects: in an MBB or bulge-bracket resume screen, being president of a student organization signals more than a side project does.
One practical wart worth knowing about: the official Word file doesn't travel well. Open the .docx in a different Word version, or import it into Google Docs, and the tab stops, margins, and line spacing quietly reflow. A lot of "Harvard template" resumes in the wild have drifted visibly from the original without their owners noticing. It's the main reason we built a browser version that renders the format identically every time.
Jake's vs Harvard: Side by Side
The Differences at a Glance
| Jake's Resume | Harvard Template | |
|---|---|---|
| Layout | Single column, tight margins, dense | Single column, generous spacing and margins |
| Section order | Education, Experience, Projects, Technical Skills | Education, Experience, Leadership & Activities, Skills & Interests |
| Fonts | Computer Modern (LaTeX serif) | Times New Roman or a similar Word serif |
| Original format | LaTeX (Overleaf) | Word document (.docx) |
| Editing difficulty | Steep without LaTeX experience | Easy to open, but formatting reflows as you edit |
| ATS parsing | Clean single-column parse | Clean single-column parse |
| Industry fit | Software, data, engineering | Finance, consulting, corporate, non-profit |
| Experience level | Students through senior engineers | Students and early-career generalists |
The structural difference that matters most: Jake's Resume has a dedicated Projects section (critical for CS students), while the Harvard template has Leadership & Activities (critical for business and liberal arts students). Jake's also includes a focused Technical Skills section, while Harvard lumps skills into an "Additional" catch-all.
Design Philosophy
The fundamental difference between these templates is who they were designed for and what they optimize.
Jake's Resume: Density-First
Designed to pack maximum technical content into one page. Tight margins, compact spacing, minimal section separators. Every pixel serves the content. Optimized for information-dense fields like software engineering.
Harvard: Readability-First
Designed for quick scanning by generalist recruiters across all industries. More generous spacing, clearer section dividers, slightly larger margins. Optimized for broad readability over information density.
Neither approach is objectively better; they serve different needs. A resume that looks "packed" to a management consultant looks "efficient" to a software engineer.
ATS Results: Both Parse Cleanly
Both templates are ATS-friendly. They share the core attributes that matter:
- Single-column layout, no tables, no multi-column sections
- Standard section headings that ATS parsers recognize
- No graphics, icons, or images that could confuse parsers
- Clean text hierarchy that extracts correctly
You won't have ATS issues with either template as designed. The one caveat sits on the Harvard side: because the official file is a Word doc that people edit by hand, real-world copies sometimes accumulate manual formatting (text boxes, stray tabs, converted tables) that does break parsing. That's an editing problem, not a template problem, but it's worth knowing.
When to Use Jake's Resume
Jake's Resume is the better choice when:
- You're applying for software engineering, data science, ML, DevOps, or other technical roles
- You have substantial technical projects you need to showcase
- You want to maximize the amount of technical content on one page
- Your target audience is technical hiring managers and engineers who value density
- You're a CS student and your Projects section is your strongest asset
When to Use the Harvard Template
The Harvard template is the better choice when:
- You're applying for non-technical roles: consulting, product management, business development, finance
- Your leadership and extracurricular experience is a key differentiator
- You're targeting generalist recruiters who scan hundreds of resumes across industries
- You want a more traditional, conservative presentation
- You're early in your career and your experience spans multiple fields (not exclusively tech)
Content Space: The Numbers
Because Jake's Resume uses tighter spacing and smaller margins, it fits approximately 15-20% more content on a single page compared to the Harvard template. For a software engineer with multiple projects and detailed experience bullets, this difference matters.
The extra space in Jake's Resume typically translates to 2-3 additional bullet points or an entire extra project entry. For new grads whose Projects section is their strongest asset, this can be the difference between a compelling and a cramped resume.
Typography and Polish
Jake's Resume (the LaTeX original) uses Computer Modern, a serif font family with exceptional typographic quality. The kerning, ligatures, and micro-typography are noticeably sharper than what Word or Google Docs can produce.
The Harvard template is typically created in Word and uses standard fonts (Times New Roman or Cambria). It looks perfectly professional, but the typographic quality is a step below LaTeX output.
This difference is subtle; most recruiters won't consciously notice it. But in a stack of 200 resumes, the LaTeX-typeset one does look slightly more polished.
Can You Combine the Best of Both?
Yes, and many successful candidates do. The best approach for tech roles:
- Use Jake's Resume layout and formatting (density, typography, Projects section)
- Borrow Harvard's emphasis on clear, accomplishment-focused bullet writing
- If you have strong leadership experience, add it as a bullet within your Experience section rather than as a separate section
- Keep the Technical Skills section from Jake's: it's essential for keyword matching
The Verdict
For software engineering and technical roles: Jake's Resume wins. It's purpose-built for the audience that reviews your resume, it maximizes content space, and the Projects section is essential for students and early-career engineers.
For non-technical or cross-functional roles: the Harvard template is a safe, proven choice with broad recognition, especially in finance and consulting where it's effectively the house style.
For product management or technical PM roles: either works, but Jake's Resume signals stronger technical orientation.
The template matters less than you think
Both templates are professional, ATS-friendly, and widely respected. The difference between getting an interview and not getting one is almost never the template: it's the content. Choose whichever template lets you present your strongest content most effectively, then spend your time polishing what you write.
FAQ: Jake's Resume vs Harvard Template
Is Jake's resume better than the Harvard template?→
For software and other technical roles, yes. Jake's fits more technical content on one page and has the Projects section tech recruiters look for. For finance, consulting, or corporate roles, the Harvard template is the safer pick. Neither is better in the abstract; they were built for different readers.
Is the Harvard resume template good?→
Yes. It's a clean, single-column, conservative format refined by Harvard's career office over decades. It's a particularly strong choice for finance, consulting, and other corporate roles where a traditional presentation is expected.
Is the Harvard resume template ATS-friendly?→
Yes. Single column, standard headings, no graphics or tables. It parses cleanly in every major ATS. The main practical risk is the official Word file drifting out of shape as you edit it, not the parsing itself.
Is Jake's resume good for FAANG?→
Yes, it's arguably the default at this point. Engineers and recruiters at large tech companies see Jake's format constantly, and its density plus the Projects section fits exactly what those reviews reward. The template won't get you the interview on its own, but Jake's will never be the reason you're filtered out.
Which template should a student use?→
Pick by your strongest material. If projects are your best asset (typical for CS students), use Jake's. If your education, leadership roles, and activities carry the resume (typical for business and liberal arts students), use the Harvard template.
Do I need LaTeX or Word to use these templates?→
No. Jake's is originally a LaTeX template and Harvard's is a Word document, but you can build both in your browser for free: no LaTeX, no Word, and no watermark on the PDF you download.