CV EditorHow to explain a gap in your CV
A gap in your work history is far more common than it feels, and rarely the problem people fear it is. What matters most is that it's accounted for, briefly and honestly, rather than left for the reader to wonder about.
Do you need to explain it at all?
Short gaps - a few weeks or a couple of months between roles - don't usually need any comment; showing month and year rather than exact dates already smooths these over. Gaps of several months or more, especially more than one on the same CV, are worth a brief line so the reader isn't left guessing. A short, factual explanation reads as more confident than no explanation at all.
Where to put it
List the gap in your employment history in the same place a job would go, in chronological order, with a short heading and the dates it covers - not a separate section or a note buried in your cover letter. Treated as a normal, dated line, it looks like part of a life rather than something hidden.
| Reason | What to write |
|---|---|
| Redundancy or between roles | Career break (redundancy). Undertook contract bookkeeping work and completed a Xero certification. |
| Caring for family | Career break: full-time caregiver for a family member. |
| Illness or recovery | Career break for health reasons. Available and ready to return to full-time work. |
| Study | Full-time study: Diploma of Project Management, TAFE NSW. |
| Travel | Career break: travelled through South-East Asia and Europe. |
| Redundancy with a long job search | Career break following redundancy. Applied for roles in supply chain management while completing short courses in inventory systems. |
You don't owe a detailed medical or personal history - "career break for health reasons" or "for personal reasons" is a complete, professional answer on its own. Say only as much as you're comfortable with.
Use the gap, don't just cover it
Where you did anything during the gap that's relevant - a course, volunteering, freelance work, caring responsibilities that used real organisational or people skills - it's worth a line of its own, written the same way as a role: what you did, and what came of it. "Volunteer treasurer for a 200-member sports club, managing membership fees and an annual budget of $40,000" tells the reader something concrete, whether or not it was paid work.
What not to do
- Don't fudge the dates. Stretching a previous role's end date to hide a gap is easy to check against references or a background check, and it costs far more trust than the gap itself ever would.
- Don't leave it for the interview to explain. An unexplained gap is more likely to keep your CV out of the interview in the first place. Address it briefly on the page; save the detail, if any is needed, for the conversation.
- Don't over-explain. A defensive paragraph draws more attention to the gap than a single factual line does.
If you're currently in a gap
It's fine to list it as ongoing: "Career break (2025 - present): caring for a family member" works the same way an ongoing role would, and signals that you're accounting for the present, not just the past.
Add it to your CV. Open the editor and add a short entry for the gap in your experience section, in its place in the timeline.