Resume.io Reviews

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Editor's Rating
Overall
Features
Price
Support

Positives

• Minimalist client
• Mobile browser-friendly editor
• Job board
• Free version available
• Refer-a-friend promotion for free users

Negatives

• Insufficient customization options
• TXT or pay-only PDF download
• Money back guarantee upon subscription

The Dutch are mostly known for being well-organized and straightforward – two attributes that you definitely need when you are applying for a new job. And Resume.io – a company founded in the Netherlands in 2012 – can make this wish come true, especially for those who have never tried an online resume builder before. Whether you choose the free version or either of the two subscriptions you will get a brutally simple – and dare we say minimalist – resume editor with which you can create an infinite amount of CVs and cover letters in TXT or PDF format. Everything Resume.io provides was conceived under the principle of minimalism: you can choose from professional templates, add only the necessary sections and search for jobs via the simple job board. However, should you have troubles you can always count on the courteous, fluent English-speaking staff and enjoy such treats like a seven-day money back guarantee, a refer-a-friend promotion and the option to save up to 70% on a longer subscription term.

Features

Upon accessing Resume.io you are greeted by an extremely simple resume builder, which is both a pro and con. As much as it is very easy to use and has a straightforward dashboard, Resume.io is so basic that many customization features anyone should expect from such software are completely missing.

For starters, uploading existing documents is out of question, whether that is either resumes or cover letters, while download options are limited to two formats only: PDF and TXT (and the former only available for subscribed users). You can’t print your documents unless downloaded in PDF, either. Second, if you want to customize your CV you can only edit the available templates and the color scheme, while everything else is more or less fixed.

However, everything else is self-explanatory. The only section you cannot move around is the personal details, where your data is automatically filled in. Still, if you want to modify the info that appears in this section, it is possible to do so at anytime except for your email address, which is fixed. As for the other sections, by default there is education, employment history and skills. There are up to 11 total different sections, the orders of which can be modified at your will. Among the extra sections there are courses, extra-curricular activities, languages and even a custom section, all of which share the same attributes as the three default sections alongside the option to remove them at any time.

Resume.io includes a simple job search engine powered by ZipRecruiter and also allows you to create cover letters for which you have to manually select the template (since they are not paired automatically with resumes). The building process has the same minimalist editing and formatting options. And yet, unlike resumes, cover letters can only be downloaded by subscribers and in PDF only.

Setup

Resume.io has a very minimalist design and offers only the most necessary features; this is far from enough on a computer, but if you want to create a resume from a mobile browser, it actually becomes useful. However, despite being an advantage, mobile editing is still not perfect: you have to keep your phone in landscape position, but more important than that is the fact that the job board and cover letter editor are unavailable in the mobile website version. Another thing to keep in mind is that the editing process cannot be started unless you create an account first, but after that is done it is possible to create as many resumes and cover letters as you want.

Unfortunately, the editor doesn’t provide much help during writing, but at least it auto-updates the preview of your resume on the right side of the screen so you can immediately see the changes you have made.

Templates

If you thought that many online resume builders are way too stingy when it comes to the number and variety of templates, Resume.io is even stingier: you can only pick from six templates in total. However, like we said before, if you’re not a subscribed user you cannot see your CV at its best, since you can only download your CV in the virtually unusable TXT format rather in its full PDF glory.

The templates themselves can only be chosen once you deem your resume ready, with the exception of the very first resume, which you can pick a style for in advance. If you want to further customize your CV there are five preset color schemes and a completely custom one, or you can turn on the photo upload feature for the three templates as well. As for anything else, customization is basically out of question.

Pricing

Quite sadly this resume builder company has a rather questionable pricing policy. Granted, you can create an account for free and you’re not limited by the amount of resumes and cover letters you can create. But the most important feature – PDF download – is only available upon subscription to the paid plans. Thankfully there is a way with which you can temporarily get access to pay-only features as many times as you want: if you successfully convince a friend to subscribe to one of the paid plans, you can download your CV in PDF once.

Other than the above workaround, there is no choice but to choose a subscription, though it can be canceled any time you want. You can go with the monthly subscription, which provides the option to try out Resume.io for seven days for $2.95, after which you can either cancel or continue paying $19.95 per month. The other option is to skip the trial period and pay $75 upfront for one year ($6.25 per month) of unlocked access to all premium features and enjoy the services for a whole year without limitations, saving 70% on the subscription fee in the process.

Support

We have to tip our hats to the staff of Resume.io thanks to their free phone service, which is available every day (albeit not 24/7) at regular U.S. working hours – a huge thing considering that the company is based in the Netherlands. They also have a contact form ready for when the phone service is unavailable.

Unfortunately this is where all the benefits stop, because the other support options are either weak or pretty much non-existent. Neither the social media pages nor the blog contains an acceptable amount of entries (in fact, Resume.io’s Twitter account has only a single post), while the FAQ has just 11 answers in total: three each covering the service and user accounts respectively, and five regarding billing. If Resume.io was a freshly started service the lack of additional support would be acceptable, but from a company that’s been on the market since 2012 it raises some serious questions.

Bottom Line

Resume.io is like the Spirit Airlines of resume builders: it does its job and it’s honest when it comes to prices (at least compared to the competition with the same pricing policy), but instead of the expected fireworks you get a measly pop for your money. There are very few customization options aside from entering your data, the limited download options in the free version are downright unacceptable and some aspects of the customer service are a joke.

If you are okay with a resume builder that only knows the basics but, at least, is available on mobile devices too, then Resume.io might be a good choice for you – provided that you are willing to try the tools out for seven days after paying an insignificant amount of money that can be fully refunded. Simplicity doesn’t always work out for resume builders, but we suspect Resume.io might know something we don’t yet…