The skills, tools and soft skills ux designer job descriptions keep asking for, grouped and ranked, with before/after bullets to show you how to use them.
UX designer postings combine process words (user research, wireframing, prototyping, usability testing), craft words (interaction design, information architecture, design systems) and tool names, above all Figma. Applicant tracking systems match those terms before a hiring manager opens your portfolio, so a resume that only says "designed user-friendly experiences" can be filtered out despite strong work. The groups below cover the vocabulary in US and Canadian UX, product design and UX/UI postings, and how to use it so your resume points clearly to the case studies in your portfolio.
Most mid-size and large employers in the US and Canada receive applications through an applicant tracking system such as Workday, Greenhouse, Lever, iCIMS or Taleo. The system parses your resume into fields (titles, dates, skills) and lets recruiters search and rank candidates by the terms in the job description. Some systems only match exact words; others recognize close variants. Either way, the safest approach is to use the same wording as the posting for every skill you genuinely have — inside a bullet that explains what you did with it.
Methods, domain knowledge and techniques that describe what you can do as a ux designer.
Say which methods you ran yourself and how they changed the design. Generalist roles want research; UI-heavy roles less so.
These terms describe your craft. Pair them with the product and platform (web app, iOS, B2B dashboard).
Accessibility keywords are increasingly required, especially for public-sector and Canadian roles under provincial accessibility laws.
Named software and platforms. Spell them exactly as the posting does — "Figma", not a generic description.
Figma is listed in most current postings. Add research and collaboration tools you actually used.
Postings name them, but a single word proves little: pair each one with an action in a bullet.
Soft skills are hard to prove with a single word. Show each one through an action: who you worked with, what you explained, what you resolved. An ATS may still match the phrase, and the recruiter gets evidence instead of a claim.
Show how you worked with product and engineering: handoff, critiques and shipped results.
Certifications are optional in UX; the portfolio is what gets interviews. Courses such as the Google UX Design Certificate, Nielsen Norman Group UX Certification or IAAP accessibility certifications (CPACC, WAS) are seen as extras in both countries.
UX vocabulary is identical across the border. Accessibility requirements are named differently: US postings refer to ADA and Section 508, Canadian ones to the Accessible Canada Act and provincial laws such as the AODA in Ontario — both point to WCAG. Titles vary ("Product Designer", "UX/UI Designer", "Interaction Designer"); keep your real title and mirror the posting in your summary. Bilingual interfaces (English/French) are a real plus for Canadian roles.
In both countries, leave out your photo, date of birth and marital status, keep the resume to one or two pages, and list experience in reverse chronological order.
Vague lines hide your keywords. Name the skill, the tool and what it was for. Keywords are highlighted in each rewrite.
Redesigned the invoicing pages.
Ran user interviews and usability testing with 12 small-business owners, then redesigned the invoicing user flows in Figma, shipping with engineering in two sprints.
Worked on our design system.
Built and documented a component library in our design systems work, with accessibility checks against WCAG 2.1 AA for color contrast and keyboard navigation.
Made screens for the mobile onboarding.
Created wireframing and high-fidelity prototyping for a mobile onboarding flow and validated it with A/B testing alongside the growth team.
Creative designer passionate about beautiful and user-friendly experiences.
UX Designer experienced in user research, interaction design and prototyping in Figma, building accessible design systems and shipping B2B and mobile products with cross-functional Agile teams.
These are examples to adapt, not real employer results: change the tools, scope and outcome to what you actually did. To see the keywords inside complete resumes, look at our ux designer resume examples (entry level, mid level and senior). Browse all tech resume examples too.
Four places carry keywords. Use each for what it does best.
Two or three lines that repeat the job title from the posting and the three or four skills it stresses most. The first text the parser and the recruiter read.
They carry the most weight because they show the keyword in use. Start with an action verb, name the tool or skill, say what it was for.
A short list grouped by type, in the posting's exact spelling. No stars or percentage bars: parsers cannot read them.
Keep your real job titles and use standard section names (Experience, Education, Skills, Certifications) so keywords land in the right field.
Keyword lists are a starting point. The job you are applying to is the real test.
Read the posting once for meaning, then a second time with a highlighter: mark every tool, method, certification and responsibility it names, and note which ones appear under "required" versus "nice to have". Compare that list with your resume. For each required term you genuinely have, make sure it appears at least once in a bullet; for each one you lack, do not add it — prepare to address it in the interview instead.
The free ATS resume checker does this comparison for you: paste the job description and your resume and it lists the matched and missing keywords. If you want a version of your resume rewritten for that posting, the AutoApplyMax AI resume builder can generate a tailored resume from your own experience (the free plan includes 1 AI credit per month) — it reorders and rephrases what is already true rather than inventing experience. Still looking for openings? Browse ux designer-related jobs.
Short answers to the questions people ask before tailoring their resume.
The most important keywords are the ones in the job description you are applying to. This page groups the terms that ux designer postings in the US and Canada use again and again — for example user research, usability testing, wireframing, prototyping — but each employer weights them differently. Copy the required skills from the posting, then check which of them you can honestly show.
Yes, at the top, as a clean URL. Recruiters often check the portfolio before reading the resume in detail; make sure the case studies match the keywords you list.
Describe the research you ran, the decision it led to and what shipped. Add an outcome only if it was measured.
Use your real title and mention the other in your summary if your work fit it. Many companies use the terms interchangeably.
Yes, if the posting is UX/UI or product design. Pure research or UX roles weight them less.
No. Repeating a word many times, or hiding keywords in white text, does not help with modern ATS ranking and is obvious to the recruiter who reads the resume next. Each keyword should appear where you actually used the skill.
Many of these skills transfer. Compare lists if you are switching roles.