See exactly how the robots read your CV — free, keyword by keyword. Then a £5 rewrite that passes. No account needed.
PDF or Word document · Any role · Results in around 30 seconds
The whole thing takes about a minute. The free scan is genuinely free — you only pay if you want the rewrite.
Upload
Drop in any PDF or Word CV. No conversion, no account, no faff.
Scan
We simulate an enterprise ATS — parsing your layout exactly as the robots do.
Score
Get your 0–100 score, every keyword gap, and every formatting blocker.
Rewrite
Pay £5 for a full ATS-optimised rewrite, delivered as a Word document.
An applicant tracking system turns your CV into plain text, then recruiters search and rank that text. Shadow CV runs the same conversion and scores what survives it, out of 100, across three parts.
Your CV is matched against the critical, important and nice-to-have terms employers use for your target role and seniority. Exact terms and close variants count; synonyms do not, because that is how ATS search works.
Columns, tables, text boxes, headers and footers, and unusual bullet characters are flagged wherever they would scramble or hide your text when the system converts your CV to plain text.
The check confirms a parser can find the sections it expects: contact details, a professional title, work experience, education and skills.
The ATS report is always free.
Free
Full ATS diagnostic report
One-off
ATS report + full rewrite
Pro
Unlimited analyses + rewrites
Yes. The score, keyword gaps, formatting issues and verdict are free, with no account and no card. You only pay if you want the £5 rewrite.
Your uploaded CV file is processed in-session and never stored on our servers. The privacy policy explains exactly what is kept.
It models the parsing behaviour of Workday, Greenhouse, Lever and iCIMS, the most widely used enterprise systems. Shadow CV is not connected to any employer's system, so the score is a simulation of how these platforms read and rank a CV.
The scale is deliberately strict, so 70 or more takes real work. Rather than chasing a number, clear every critical keyword gap and every formatting blocker in the report. How the score is calculated.
Yes for the CV itself, but many NHS and Civil Service applications use online forms rather than a CV upload, so the wording of your answers matters as much. See the NHS guide and the Civil Service guide.
Never. The rewrite restructures and rephrases what is already in your CV, and adds missing keywords only where your existing experience genuinely supports them.
How UK ATS screening actually works — and what to do about it.
Acas defines redundancy as a dismissal where the role is no longer needed, which is why it costs a CV almost nothing. What does cost something is the wrong leaving date, a profile that opens with the redundancy, and a gap left unexplained.
9 min readGOV.UK says a reference can say you were sacked, as long as it is fair and accurate. Your CV, though, has no place for a reason for leaving at all. Where a dismissal can actually surface - the reference, the application form, the interview - and what to put in each.
10 min readGOV.UK is clear that your employment rights are protected during maternity leave and your pay still runs through payroll. On a CV, that makes the leave part of the job, not a gap. When to mention it, how to word it, and the one formatting choice that turns a year of leave into a fake gap.
10 min readThe National Careers Service says volunteering belongs in your work history alongside paid jobs, yet most CVs bury it under hobbies. Where volunteering goes on a UK CV, how to label it honestly, and what an employer can actually verify.
10 min readUpload your CV for a free ATS score — then get a full rewrite that passes for £5. No account, no subscription, results in around 30 seconds.