Resume vs CV in Ireland: Which One to Send (2026)

Short answer: in Ireland they are the same thing, and it is called a CV. If an Irish job ad asks for your CV, send the one or two page document an American would call a resume. What does change is the detail, especially if your resume was written for the US or another country. This page is the list of those changes.

What the two words mean, country by country

The confusion comes from America. There, a resume is the short document for a job and a CV is the long academic record. Ireland and the UK never split the words that way. Here “CV” covers both, and “resume” mostly turns up in ads written by international companies.

Where	Job application document	Usual length	The long academic version
Ireland	CV	2 pages (1 early on)	Also called a CV, or an academic CV
UK	CV	2 pages	Academic CV
US and Canada	Resume	1 page	CV
EU institutions	Europass CV, or their own form	Often 3 or more	Europass CV

On length, the University of Limerick careers service puts it plainly: a two-page CV is the market norm in Ireland. One page is fine for a first job or a student. Three pages is too many unless you are applying for a lecturing or research post.

When an Irish employer does want the long version

Universities, research centres and some funding bodies ask for an academic CV. It keeps going for as long as your record does: publications, conference papers, grants, teaching, supervision, committees. If the ad asks for a list of publications, or the post is a lectureship, postdoc or fellowship, write the long one. For every other job, including graduate schemes, write the two-page version and keep the extras for interview.

Turning a US or overseas resume into an Irish CV

If your resume already works, you are not starting again. Most of the changes take minutes. Go down the list with your document open beside it.

Paper size. Switch from US Letter to A4. A Letter-size PDF prints with odd margins in an Irish office, and it is the quickest giveaway that a CV was not written for here.
Spelling. Irish English follows British spelling: organised, programme, centre, licence (the noun), colour. Set your spellchecker to English (Ireland) or English (UK) and run it once.
Dates. Write months as words: “Sept 2023 to present”. In Ireland 03/04/2024 means 3 April, and a recruiter reading American dates will get your timeline wrong.
Personal data. Remove any photo, date of birth, age, marital status, number of children, nationality, religion and ID numbers. Never put your PPS number on a CV.
Address. Town and county is enough: “Ranelagh, Dublin 6” or “Ennis, Co. Clare”. If you are still abroad, give the city and the month you arrive.
Phone. Use an Irish mobile as soon as you have one. Until then, write the number in full international format so it can be dialled from here.
Right to work. One line under your contact details if you are not an Irish or EU/EEA citizen. More on this below.
Qualifications. Keep the real name of your degree and add its Irish level (see below). A GPA means little here, so drop it unless it is strong and the job is a graduate role.
Length. A tight one-page resume can grow to two pages. Spend the space on results with numbers in your two most recent jobs.
References. End with “References available on request”. Do not attach a reference sheet unless the ad asks for one.

Before and after: the top of the page

US resume	Irish CV
JORDAN MILLER · Austin, TX 78704 · (512) 555-0148	Jordan Miller · Ranelagh, Dublin 6 · 087 123 4567
Objective: seeking a challenging role in operations	Profile: operations coordinator, 4 years in e-commerce fulfilment, cut late orders by 30%
B.S. Business Administration, GPA 3.6	BSc Business Administration, University of Texas (comparable to NFQ Level 8)
(nothing about work permission)	Stamp 1G: full-time work permitted

The “Objective” line is worth a mention of its own. Irish CVs open with a short profile instead: two or three lines that say what you do and what you have achieved, not what you are hoping for. Our CV personal statement examples show the formula.

Your qualifications: give the Irish level

An Irish recruiter knows what a Level 8 degree is. They may not know what your degree from abroad equals. NARIC Ireland, run by Quality and Qualifications Ireland (QQI), has a free online database of over 2,000 foreign qualifications. For each one you can download a comparability statement that maps it to a level on the Irish National Framework of Qualifications (NFQ). Citizens Information gives an example: an Australian Bachelor Honours Degree is comparable to an Irish honours bachelor’s degree at NFQ Level 8.

Put the level in brackets after the degree, as in the example above, and keep the statement ready to send if asked. Two limits are worth knowing. The statement is advice, not a legal document, and the employer makes the final call. And if your job is a regulated profession, such as nursing, teaching or engineering, recognition comes from that profession’s Irish body, not from NARIC.

Your right to work: one line, not a paragraph

Employers hiring someone from outside the EU want to know one thing early: can this person start without a work permit application? Your immigration stamp answers it. The Irish Immigration Service sets out what each stamp allows. The ones that come up most on CVs:

Stamp 4: you can work without an employment permit. Write “Stamp 4: no employment permit needed”.
Stamp 1G (Third Level Graduate Programme, after studying here): you can work full time without a permit for the length of the stamp. Write the stamp and its end month.
Stamp 2 (student): casual work up to 20 hours a week in term and 40 in the holidays. Say so on a CV for part-time work; it is exactly what a shop or café manager needs to know.
Stamp 1 with an employment permit: the permit is tied to an employer, so a new job usually means a new permit. Say what you hold and let the employer ask the rest at interview.

If you are an EU or EEA citizen you do not need a permit, and most recruiters know that. Add “EU citizen” only if your work history is all outside Europe and they might wonder.

What stays exactly the same

The bones of a good American resume work in Ireland too. Work history goes newest first. Each job gets a few bullets that start with a verb and end with a result, preferably a number. One tailored CV for each application still beats one generic version sent everywhere. If your resume already does that, the list above is the whole job.

For the full layout, section by section, see the Irish CV format. To write it from scratch, the how to write a CV guide covers every section. Or open the free CV builder: it is set to A4 and the Irish layout already, so the paper size and section order take care of themselves.

Frequently asked questions

Is a resume the same as a CV in Ireland?

Yes, for ordinary jobs. Irish job ads say "send your CV", and they mean the one or two page summary that Americans call a resume. The only time an Irish employer wants something longer is an academic or research post, where the CV lists publications, grants and teaching in full.

Can I send a one-page resume to an Irish employer?

You can, and nobody will reject it for being short. But two pages is the norm here, so a one-page US resume often reads as thin next to Irish CVs. Use the extra space for results with numbers, not for padding.

Should I write "Curriculum Vitae" at the top?

No. Your name goes at the top in a larger font. The recruiter already knows what the document is.

My home country expects a photo and date of birth. Should I keep them?

Take them off. Irish employment equality law protects nine grounds, including age, civil status, family status and race (which covers nationality). An Irish recruiter does not want information on a CV that could look like the basis of a discriminatory decision, so a photo or date of birth tends to count against you.

Do I need to say I have a visa on my CV?

If you are not an Irish or EU/EEA citizen, one line under your contact details saves the employer a question: your stamp and what it lets you do, for example "Stamp 4: no employment permit needed". Irish, UK and EU citizens can leave it off, or write "EU citizen" if a work history spent outside Europe might make the employer wonder.

Is a Europass CV accepted in Ireland?

It is accepted, but rarely what Irish employers expect. The Europass editor on the EU website produces a long, form-style document. For Irish jobs, a plain two-page CV in the Irish layout reads better. Keep Europass for EU institutions or programmes that ask for it.

Resume vs CV in Ireland: which one to send