How Far Back Should Your Resume Go? (Quick Answer)

Quick answer: Include the last 10-15 years of relevant work experience. For most professionals, this provides enough history to demonstrate your career progression without including outdated information.

But this rule has important exceptions. Here's how to decide exactly what to include on your resume.

The 10-15 Year Rule Explained

Why 10-15 years? Several reasons:

1. Relevance decreases over time. What you did 20 years ago is less predictive of your current abilities than what you did recently.

2. Technology changes. Skills from decades ago may be obsolete. Mentioning Windows 98 expertise doesn't help.

3. Age discrimination is real. Including 30+ years of experience can trigger unconscious bias, even though this is illegal.

4. Resume real estate is limited. Every line about ancient history is a line you can't use for recent achievements.

5. Hiring managers skim. They focus on your most recent 2-3 roles. Older positions get less attention anyway.

When to Include Less Than 10 Years

Include less if:

• You're early in your career. Recent graduates and early-career professionals should include all relevant experience, even if it's only 2-5 years.

• You've made a career change. Focus on experience relevant to your new field, even if it's recent. Older experience from your previous career may not help.

• Your older experience is unrelated. If you spent your first decade in a completely different field, summarize it briefly or omit it.

When to Include More Than 15 Years

Include more if:

• Older experience is directly relevant. If a job from 18 years ago is the most relevant to your target role, include it.

• You're targeting senior/executive roles. C-suite and executive positions often expect to see a longer career trajectory.

• The role requires specific past experience. Some specialized roles want to see your full history in that field.

• You have notable achievements or employers. Worked at a famous company or had a notable accomplishment? Include it.

What to Do with Older Experience

If you have relevant experience beyond 15 years, you have options:

Option 1: Brief Summary Section

Create an "Earlier Career" or "Additional Experience" section:

EARLIER CAREER
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Various positions in software development at IBM, Oracle,
and Startup Inc. (1995-2010)

Option 2: Title-Only Listing

Include job titles without dates or details:

ADDITIONAL EXPERIENCE
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Software Engineer, IBM
Systems Analyst, Oracle

Option 3: Omit Entirely

If older experience adds nothing to your candidacy, leave it off. Your resume isn't your complete work history. It's a marketing document.

Resume Length by Experience Level

What About Gaps?

If trimming your resume creates visible gaps, you have options:

1. Use years only, not months. "2019 - 2023" hides a mid-year start or end.

2. Address gaps directly. For significant gaps, explain them rather than hiding them.

3. Include relevant gap activities. Freelance work, volunteering, or education during gaps can fill timeline holes.

Education: Different Rules

Education follows different conventions:

• Remove graduation dates after 10+ years (prevents age inference)
• Keep degrees regardless of age (education doesn't expire)
• Remove high school once you have higher education
• Include recent certifications with dates (shows current skills)

Example:

EDUCATION
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
MBA, Harvard Business School
BS Computer Science, MIT
Google Project Management Certificate (2024)

No dates for degrees, date for recent certification.

Industry Exceptions

Some industries have different norms:

Academia / Research

Include your full publication and research history regardless of age. Academic CVs can be many pages.

Federal Government

Government applications often require complete work history. Follow the specific application requirements.

Law

Include all relevant legal experience. Law is credentialist and values seniority.

Medicine

Include all clinical experience and credentials. Medical CVs follow different conventions.

Quick Decision Framework

Ask yourself these questions for each old position:

1. Is it relevant to my target role? If no, consider omitting.
2. Does it show progression? If no, it may not add value.
3. Would it raise concerns? Very old tech skills or many short stints might hurt.
4. Does it fit on 1-2 pages? If you're over length, older positions go first.

Examples by Scenario

Scenario: 20 years of experience, same industry

Include: Last 10-15 years in detail, brief summary of earlier career Why: Recent experience matters most, but career continuity has value

Scenario: 20 years experience, career change 5 years ago

Include: 5 years in new field in detail, brief mention of previous career Why: Relevant experience matters more than total years

Scenario: 8 years experience, single employer

Include: All 8 years with multiple roles broken out Why: Show progression and growth within the company

Scenario: 25 years experience, targeting executive role

Include: 15-20 years showing leadership progression Why: Executive roles expect to see senior trajectory

Frequently Asked Questions

Should I include jobs I was fired from?

Yes, if they're recent and relevant. Gaps are worse than short stints. In interviews, be prepared to discuss briefly and positively.

Should I include unrelated jobs?

Only if they fill gaps or demonstrate transferable skills. A summer job from college doesn't belong on a senior resume.

What if my best experience is from 15+ years ago?

Include it if it's directly relevant to your target role. Just don't let your resume become a history lesson.

Should I include every promotion at a company?

Yes, show progression by listing multiple titles under one employer. This demonstrates growth without adding pages.

Does the 10-15 year rule apply to LinkedIn?

LinkedIn can include more history since it's not page-limited. But prioritize recent, relevant experience there too.

Key Takeaways

1. 10-15 years is standard for most professional resumes.

2. Relevance beats recency. Include older experience if it's directly relevant to your target role.

3. Summarize, don't delete. Use brief summaries for older relevant experience rather than detailed bullets.

4. Remove graduation dates from degrees after 10+ years.

5. Your resume isn't your autobiography. It's a targeted marketing document for a specific role.

The goal isn't to list everything you've done. It's to present the experience that makes you the best candidate for the job you want.

Need help deciding what to include? Try ResumeFast's ATS Checker to see how your current resume performs, or use our resume builder to create a targeted resume that emphasizes your most relevant experience.