How Long Do Recruiters Actually Spend on a Resume?

Widely-cited studies put initial screening at roughly 6-8 seconds — here's what that means for how you write.

1. The top third of the page (name, title, summary, top bullet) gets read; everything below is skimmed at best on the first pass.
2. This is why your most relevant, most impressive line should never be buried under three other jobs.
3. A resume that survives the 8-second scan gets a second, slower read — that's when full sentences and detail matter.
4. Design clarity (clean structure, obvious hierarchy) matters as much as content in that first pass, because it's genuinely a skim, not a read.

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